Deliverance: Book 1-The Rise
by NobleMETA
Summary: When you have the chance to fight back against those who bring you down, to take away the power that the criminals, the corrupt, the oppressive have over you, would you just stand there and let it happen, or would you Rise up and take back your home, your freedom, your life?
1. The World As We Know It

I knew that I shouldn't have cut through this damn alleyway. I always knew that the city was a bad place to live, then again the whole damn world itself is in total disarray. Vale is probably one of the worst places right now though, what with crime on the rise here in the capital city. Knowing this, I should be smart enough to know that I shouldn't be running through alleyways in order to get home quicker. Now here I am, a mugger in my face, holding a gun up to my head, and now I'm freaking out. And this is not anywhere near how I thought my day should go at all!

Actually, I should explain a couple of things first. To start off, my name is Ruby Rose. I live in the 'lovely' city of Veldin, the capital city of the Vale Kingdom, one of the most crime heavy cities in the entire world of Remnant. Second, the reason why I say that this city is one of the most crime heavy cities is because of some of the past few years and what has been going on in the world.

A couple of years ago, humanity had finally driven the Grimm back enough to the point where they were no longer considered a threat. The war itself, however, took a major toll on the people, and the economy of the world. Many Kingdoms were thrown into disarray, and as a result, criminal elements took over and started to take the Kingdoms bit by bit. The Kingdoms tried to fight back, but all they would ever do is slow them down for a little bit, or provoke them even further. Eventually, most of the Kingdoms went under martial law, causing even more problems within the cities. People would start to riot, curfews were initiated, but the worst of all, innocent people were occasionally kidnapped, murdered, or victimized in general, and the military and police force wouldn't do anything to fight back. Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if the police force cut a few deals with the criminal empires in order to save their own skins.

The worst of the worst is a group known as the White Fang. They are probably the world's biggest criminal empire by now. They're made up of a large contingency of Faunus who have been displaced during the war, and discriminated against for being different. Personally, I love Faunus, they are some of the best people I know, but the White Fang, they are terrible people. I know so many Faunus that agree with me, in fact, most would agree that the White Fang is a terrible organization, but no one can do anything about it. The White Fang is too large in number, and if people even start to stand up to them, they decide to just, remove them from the equation. Politicians have been killed in drive by shootings, local leaders had their cars explode when they started them up, hell they even openly gunned down the few good cops in broad daylight, and get away with all of it. Unfortunately, they aren't going away any time soon, and that's what sucks the most about this. We're basically caught in the middle of a cold war, and we're paying the biggest price for it.

That doesn't mean that all is wrong, not by any standard. There are a few people who stand up and fight back against the crime that plagues the Kingdoms. Vigilantes of sorts have risen up and taken a stand, people with super-human powers that use them to protect the people. What sucks though, is that the police are actually calling for most of them to be arrested because they are apparently breaking the law in doing what they do. That's just another reason why people don't really like the police here, or most of anywhere. Honestly, I really wish that I could do something to make the world a better place, like the heroes who protect us every chance they get.

Anyway, you guys are probably wondering why I'm in the situation that I'm in right now. Let's just say that I was running late getting out of work, and I needed to run home before curfew got initiated. Unfortunately for me, I work in a coffee shop that just happens to be located on the COMPLETE OPPOSITE SIDE OF TOWN THAT I LIVE ON! It also doesn't help that this coffee shop stays open pretty late into the night, and I don't have a permit to be out past curfew due to travel time for my job. I normally work in the mornings, but on this particular day, one of my coworkers JUST SO HAPPENED to be sick, and asked me to cover for them, since I actually had the day off for once. So not only did I have to cancel on spending time with my sister, Yang, but I also had to work an extra day that I wasn't scheduled for.

Ok, getting side tracked, where was I? Oh right.

So, since I got out so late and didn't have a special permit to be out for extended curfew, I needed to run back to my apartment before the timer struck and the military started to patrol the streets. I've heard enough stories of people being arrested for getting caught outside after curfew, and having bad things happen to them in jail. I wasn't exactly in the mood to have that happen to me tonight. Unfortunately, in my moment of brilliance, I thought it was great to cut through the alleys in the hopes that I would be able to get home quicker. Stupid me, I ended up running into a mugger looking to prey on innocent people.

Now, here I am, a gun pointed directly at my face, and I'm freaking the fuck out! Who wouldn't freak out at something like this happening to them? Dear god, I try to avoid getting into trouble, and now I'm practically about to die, and there isn't a thing I could do about it.

"Just hurry up and give me the money, lady," The mugger kept shouting to me, ordering me around. I hated that he was giving me orders like a dog, but given that he had a gun to me, I wasn't about to argue with him.

As I was reaching for my purse to just give to the guy, shaking in terror, I suddenly heard the guy in front of me start to shout and freak out. Now, normally I would be confused as to what was happening, but that wasn't until I noticed one very important detail. First things first, what I noticed was that the two of us are no longer alone out here, someone else showed up. But what brought a smile to my face was what had happened now that I looked up after trying to reach for my purse.

Not only was the gun no longer in the hand of the guy who was trying to mug me, but it was in the hands of the newcomer, who was standing a good 15-20 feet behind him. Second thing, was the pretty recognizable outfit of one of the most well known vigilantes out there. A leather corset covering the torso of a woman, with a pair of bronze greaves, a bronze gauntlet on her left arm, and crimson red gloves on both of her hands. A metal circlet also braced her upper left arm, and she wore a belt that went around her waist, three cloths coming down behind her rear and reaching the back of her knees. Throw on a pair of crimson red leggings, and a cloak that covered not only her head, shoulders, and upper chest, but it also had two strips of cloth coming down behind her shoulders. Almost immediately I could tell who it was, even without being able to see the face underneath the hood, and I'm more than glad to see this person standing there.

"Polaris," I whispered to myself.

* * *

Tonight has certainly been a calm night thus far. No one seemed to be in that much trouble, but I know for certain that it could easily change in a heartbeat. I've been helping to save the lives of this city for quite a while now, and that experience has told me to always be ready for something to happen out of nowhere.

Let me introduce myself first. My name is Pyrrha Nikos, but I go by a second name. Right now, I'm what people refer to as a vigilante with the name, Polaris. I'm one of the heroes who seeks to protect this city from the terrors of the White Fang. So far, it's been pretty straight forward, but nothing is that simple, and life has a way of screwing around with you after a while.

You might be asking yourself how I became one of the heroes that are seeking to do what's right. Well, part of it was that I was in the right place at the right time. See, I'm a part of an organization that works with people all over the world, seeking to bring peace to the Kingdoms and the cities within them. I personally have only been around for about a year and a half, but I've definitely shown that I'm capable of fighting for what is right.

The person who leads us, well, let's just say he immediately gave me a purpose once I found out about the powers that I have. Powers that I discovered during desperate times. He gave me a family, people I could count on, and helped me develop those powers that I apparently held inside of me for a long time. Now, I seek to bring peace to the city of Veldin, and despite the opposition from the local law enforcement, I know that my work is making a difference.

Most of the time, we don't end up going out alone, and actually I'm jumping from rooftop to rooftop with one of my friends. He's one of the people who I defend the city with, one of the first friends I made when I went to become one of the guardians hidden deep in the night. My friend Ren, otherwise known as Lotus to the people, was out with me right now as we were searching throughout the city in the hopes that we could help someone out. He was a normally quiet character, unlike his overly loud and rambunctious girlfriend, Nora. She works as a mercenary, for a group that just so happens to have the same ideologies and long term goals that we do.

Of course, as I was patrolling through the city, I just so happened to hear the sounds of someone in trouble. I stopped moving immediately, and motioned for Lotus to wait up for a moment while I investigated. In the alleyway below me, I noticed a woman getting mugged with a gun to her head. Without hesitation, I jumped off of the roof and landed behind the guy, activating my powers as soon as I hit the ground. With no resistance at all, I had the gun pulled towards me, and it was now resting comfortably in my hand.

So, these powers of mine, I should do a bit of an explanation on them. Most people wouldn't be able to pull a .44 caliber revolver out of someone's hand using only their mind. The thing is, I have the ability to control the magnetic current of an object, and manipulate it to my will. It works on just about anything metal, and I can either pull it towards me, or push it away from me at will. A simple handgun being pulled from someone who doesn't suspect a thing is child's play compared to some of the more daring stunts I've pulled in my somewhat short time.

With the gun out of his hand, the mugger nearly crapped his shorts in fear. Normally, I would knock the guy unconscious and leave him to the police, but I was feeling generous, and could tell that the guy was afraid now that he was disarmed. I could understand why he did this, even if it was wrong. Times are desperate after all, and many people feel like they have to turn to these drastic steps in order to just get by. I could tell in this guy's eyes that he was in this situation.

With a swift motion, I tossed the gun up to Lotus above me, and walked up to the guy. While I was going to show him mercy, I still needed to remind him that doing these things isn't the greatest idea out there. He needed to know that he was getting a second chance, and that he shouldn't waste it.

"Leave," I said to him firmly. "Leave and don't pull another stunt like this again. You're getting a second chance, now don't waste it." Without a second thought, the guy took off down the street, and now my attention turned towards the woman who was almost mugged.

I don't know why I thought about this, but something about this woman screamed to me that she was going to have a major impact on my life. Her short, dark brown hair was tipped red, and she had these gorgeous silver eyes that most people could get lost in for a long time. Deciding to put these feelings aside for the time being, I needed to make sure that she was alright.

"You alright, ma'am?" I asked her.

"Mhm," She replied. "I can't believe you're really here! The actual Polaris, and I'm guessing that's the Lotus above us on the rooftop right now!"

I couldn't help but chuckle a little bit at the pure jubilation that this girl was exhuming. Even with the voice modulators we all wore to disguise us, it was clear to tell I was laughing. "You certainly seem to know about us," I commented.

"Well, it isn't every day that the heroes come in and save your day," The girl replied. "You guys are all incredible, every single one of you. There are days where I wish that I could be just like you."

This girl definitely seemed to be incredibly charmed by our order and the work we do for the world. It was such a wonderful thing to see such kindness and light in the world, no matter how dark it seemed at times. "Well, who knows, you may be able to help change the world one of these days, even without super powers." It was completely true, too. You'd be surprised what you could do, even without the powers that most people wish they had.

Smiling in response, the girl seemed to be bursting at the seams with joy over the praise that I was giving her. That joy turned into fear as she seemed to recall something, but I didn't know what was going through this girls head.

"Oh man, I'm going to be in so much trouble," She said, panicking.

"Wait, what do you mean?" I asked the girl, hoping to help her in some way.

"Curfew starts soon, and I remembered why I got into this situation in the first place!" She started to shout. "My home's all the way on the other side of town, and I'll never get back in time at this rate. Oh god, I'm going to get into trouble, I just know it. The military is going to find me out after curfew and they won't care that I was called in to cover someone else's shift, and-"

I decided that I was going to do something for this girl and help her get home. "Well then, I think I can help you some more, how about that?"

"Really? You'd do that for me?" The girl asked in response. When I nodded, she got super excited and seemed to be jumping around in joy. I already knew this was going to be fun, I could just tell from the singular moment that we had shared together.

"Alright, hope you don't mind a piggyback ride," I said to her and turned around to give her a chance to climb on. Once I knew that she was securely in place, I leapt up towards the ceiling, using my power to give myself an extra boost. Having the power of magnetism was great when part of your armor was made of metal, it made jumping across the city much easier.

Once we reached the rooftop, I could tell the girl was both excited and scared at the same time. I walked over to Lotus and, without saying anything, he almost knew what was going on. "So, where are we bringing her to?"

"Oh my god, I can't believe I actually get to meet you guys," The girl said before any other words could be spoken. "This is so exciting, you guys are super cool and incredible...and I'm probably rambling like an idiot right now so I'm just gonna shut up right now."

"It's fine," Lotus said to the girl on my back. "I can understand why you would be excited to meet us. Now, why don't you tell us where you live so that we can help you get home on time?"

"I live out on Crescent Road, on the west side of the city," The girl explained.

"Well then, I hope you're ready for a ride," I mentioned as I started to back up towards the back ledge of the building, preparing to get a running start. "This is where the fun begins." Once I had reached the edge, I looked back and waited to see a nod in response, noticing the excitement in her silver eyes once more. Once I saw that she was ready, I started to run towards the other edge of the building and took the first leap onward.

* * *

 **AN: Oh boy, this has been a lot of planning and now it's starting to come together! I present to you, the first chapter in what I refer to as my own personal Vigilante AU! If you couldn't tell by the title of the story, this is just the first story in multiple parts that will be taking place, and I can't wait to get to some of the points that I want to hit later on in the story.**

 **Shoutout to MartunaMajor for editing this for me and making sure it is up to snuff.**

 **Also, shout out to BurningPeace as well. It was after reading the most recent chapter of Fang's Embrace (which you guys should also be reading since it's a fucking amazing story) that I got this idea in the first place. So fuck you Peace, you gave me a new idea! In all seriousness though, this idea has been great and I really do gotta thank him for what he wrote, which inspired me to write this out.**

 **Anyway, thanks for reading this first chapter. Can't promise when the next update will be, but I can promise that it's going to be good! Please let me know what you think of this because this is my newest idea and I'm absolutely in love with it.**


	2. Genuine Interest

Ruby

I couldn't believe that this was happening to me! Here I was, riding piggyback to one of the vigilante heroes that I had been looking up to for a while now, and this woman was super nice about it! Didn't even hesitate to offer her help either! How come the world wasn't filled with people who were similar to her? Polaris was being super chill about it too, and I'm sure that Lotus was also relaxed about it as well.

While I was being carried across the city, I finally got to take a good look at Lotus and saw what he looked like. He was wearing a green overcoat in which the sleeves were down past his hands, so I couldn't tell if he was grasping onto anything. Would be useful in a fight if the other guys couldn't see you holding a weapon. Hell, I can't even see the gun that was thrown up to Lotus from Polaris earlier. Lotus was also wearing a pair of beige slacks and kung-fu shoes. But what was the most interesting thing about it was a cloth that he had wrapped around his head that covered his eyes.

My only guess was that the cloth itself was transparent on one side so that Lotus could see out from his side, while keeping everyone else from seeing his face. It also had a pretty cool pattern on it if you asked me, one of those ones that seemed to be of an ancient cultural design. I wasn't all that surprised that everyone seemed to be keeping their faces concealed though, probably something that came with being a vigilante.

After taking a better look at Lotus, I focused my thoughts back onto the moment in front of me. The feeling of Polaris' body carrying mine, the wind in my hair as we sped across the rooftops over the city, the adrenaline coursing through my body as this was all happening around me. I honestly have never felt a feeling quite like this before. Oh man, this is so exciting, I really don't know if I'll want to let go even when we get back to my apartment building. I don't know why, but something just seems to be so compelling to me right now.

"Hey, I got a question," Polaris asked me.

I didn't realize how lost in my own thoughts I was until I heard Polaris speak to me. "Yeah?" I responded back, straining to hear her over the sounds of the wind rushing past my ears.

"You obviously know about myself and Lotus," Polaris led off with. "I'm assuming you also know of many others whom we work with as well."

I really didn't want to admit it based off of how much I was practically fangirling earlier today, but they were just so cool, and this was so surreal, I felt like I was compelled to talk with Polaris about it since she asked me.

"Well, I guess you could say that I do know many others," I began to say. "Fellow heroes like Mimic, Arch Mage, The Red Blade, and I'm sure there's more out there in the other kingdoms as well."

"You seem to understand quite a bit about us," Polaris said. "And based off of how you reacted to us earlier, I figured you were alright with what it is that we're striving to do for the world."

"Yeah, you guys are such a huge inspiration for me!" I proclaimed. "I know I said it already, but I seriously would love to do what you do, because of how much I'd be able to help people. All I do now is serve coffee, and it sucks because I feel like that doesn't do much for us."

"You'd be surprised how much normal people are appreciated," Polaris replied to me. "Not everyone who is a hero has superpowers. Sometimes, the biggest heroes are the ones that serve coffee for someone. Sometimes it's the mailman who delivers a package just in time for someone else to make a gift meant for a loved one. You don't always need to have powers to make a difference in someone's life. It's what you do with your life, what kind of person you strive to be, that determines whether you're a hero or not."

I guess Polaris was right, and she certainly had a great way of putting it into perspective. I never really thought of how much of a difference I was making for the people I serve coffee to bright and early in the morning.

"What's your name?"

In all honesty, I was a bit surprised to hear Polaris ask me that. "Um, not that I don't want to say what it is, but why do you care to know what my name is?"

Polaris had a good chuckle at that. "Well, if you must know, I feel it gives me more of a reason to fight harder than I normally do. I know that you and many others will count on me to help keep you safe, and so I want to know who it is that I'm working to save. Plus, you seem really interested in us, and I wanted to learn who it was that spent so much time learning about us and caring about what we do."

"Oh," I replied to Polaris. I really can't believe that she is this interested in knowing who I am, god, I'm so giddy right now. "Well, my name is Ruby Rose."

"Well, Ruby Rose," Polaris looked like she was about to say something meaningful to me. "You are a truly kind person, one that I would be glad to call a friend in real life. Your enthusiasm and kindness are rivaled by few, and I know, deep down, that you will go far in life. Promise me that you'll keep moving forward in life to your fullest potential."

"I promise," I said in response. Let's face it, she certainly is inspirational, I'll give her that.

"Well then," Polaris continued on. "We should be arriving shortly. Care to direct us over to your apartment?"

"Oh yeah, I can do that," I mentioned before noticing where we were. Ironically, we were practically on top of my apartment already. "Wait!"

Stopping on the rooftop, Polaris and Lotus both looked at me with anticipation. "We're actually on the roof of my apartment," I mentioned. "Just gotta let me in through the front door so that I don't raise any suspicion."

"Sounds reasonable enough," Polaris said as she walked to the edge and leapt downward. I was a little surprised at first, but when we stopped moving, I loosened my grip. I didn't even realize how tight my grip was until I released it. "Well, this is your stop."

Climbing down off of Polaris' back, I was surprised to see that she didn't look tired at all. "How are you not tired?"

"You'd be surprised how strong you get when you've been doing this for as long as I have," Polaris responded confidently. "In any case, you should head back inside. I'm sure you've had a long day, and should catch up on some sleep."

In all honesty, I was about to tell her otherwise, but then I just so happened to yawn, so that kind of blew that out of the water. "Yeah, I guess so," I ended up saying instead, a little disappointed that I had to go back inside. "I guess this is goodbye."

"I would say that I hope to see you again," Polaris said. "But, usually when people run into me, it's because bad stuff is happening, and I need to save their lives. So instead, I'll say that I hope we run into each other in good circumstances."

"Yeah, that works," Ruby replied. "Well, same to you. Anyway, it was really nice to meet you, Polaris. Keep up the good work, we're all counting on you!" I turned and walked over to the front of my building, and with just a few minutes left to spare, I walked into the front door of my apartment building. I sped up to the apartment I specifically lived in, and with my heart still beating rapidly, I threw open the door to my home.

"OH MY GOD JAUNE YOU WON'T BELIEVE WHAT JUST HAPPENED TO ME!" I shouted to him right as I entered the apartment. Normally, I was much quieter when I entered the apartment, but after what happened, I just felt like I could shout this to the whole world. It just so happened that Jaune was my roommate, and so he got to hear all the insanity I normally threw his way.

See, Jaune and I have been friends since we were kids. Grew up on the same street, went to the same school, and now, as a result of being such awesome friends, he was being the best roommate as well. Jaune had his own room in the apartment, I had mine, and we both shared pretty much everything that our apartment had to offer. Honestly, if it wasn't for the fact that I'm straight up gay, we probably would've been dating by now. But, that's besides the point, he's more like a brother to me anyways.

"Jeez, any reason you felt the need to shout not even a second into entering the apartment?" Jaune asked me as he was cooking on the stove. "Also, dinner should be ready in a few minutes. I would say that it's your turn tonight, but I know you had to cover a shift at work today."

"Dude, I have some pretty freaking insane news I gotta tell you," I mentioned. "And hurry up with food, I'm STARVING!"

"Ok, ok, jeez, calm down," Jaune groaned as he started to bring the food out to the table. "So, what happened that got you this excited?"

"Well, you know how I got asked to cover a shift today at work?" I started off by saying, barely giving Jaune chance to even nod in acknowledgement. "Well, anyway, I was running home so that I could get back before curfew. While I was running, I ran into this guy who was trying to mug me."

"Wait, whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa…" Jaune interrupted as I was explaining. "What the fuck are you talking about exactly? You were almost mugged?"

"Oh some guy had a gun to my head, no big deal," I said. Honestly, I knew Jaune was going to say something, so I decided it was in my best interest to keep talking and move on before he got a word in edgewise. "So anyway, I had a gun to my head and then the next thing I know, the gun was pulled away from the muggers hands like it was nothing more than a string. Turns out, it was Polaris who saved my butt. Let the mugger go, saying how he had a second chance to improve his life."

"Wow," was the only thing that Jaune could say in response.

"Yeah, you're telling me," I replied. "So then, I got a ride over here since I still had a long walk ahead of me. Even better, Polaris herself gave me a piggyback ride so that I could have time to spare before reaching curfew. So, that leads me to where I am now."

"Damn, you really had an interesting day if I do say so myself," Jaune mentioned to me, taking a bite out of the chicken cutlets that he had sliced, breaded and cooked up for us. "Just be sure that you're more careful from now on. I don't know how pissed off your dad would be if you got hurt, or worse, Yang."

"Well, I'm sure Yang would just hunt down the person responsible," I replied as I dug into the food. "She is a mercenary after all."

"One of the one's working with the vigilantes, if I'm not mistaken, correct?"

"Yeah, so I'm sure things would go over well," I replied. Normally, I wasn't happy about what Yang did for a living, but in some cases, I understood. She had the chance to make a difference in the world, so she took it. "Anyway, enough about that, I really need to get back to talking about what happened!"

* * *

Pyrrha

It was strange watching Ruby leave, I don't know why, but I had this feeling deep down that I wasn't done seeing her yet. Still, now that the job was done, it was time for me to move onto the next task. So, once I was sure that Ruby reached the inside of her apartment building safely, I leapt upwards to the roof of the building where Ren was still waiting for me.

Once I was up there, I pulled the hood down so that I could feel the breeze on my face. Sometimes, it got really stuffy wearing the hood, so this was a nice chance for me to breathe for a moment. "So," I said to Ren since we had a moment. "Now what do we do?"

Ren shrugged his shoulders at first, nothing coming to mind, for there was no imminent threat in the area. "Honestly, I would suggest we head back to base for the evening. It's getting really late, and besides, most people are already back in their homes because of curfew."

"Alright then," I said to him as I lifted my hood back up and over my head, turning my modulator on as it came up. "Let's head home."

As we made our way back across the city, I only had one thought on my mind. Something about Ruby seemed intense, as if she had hidden potential about her that was ready for release. I needed to talk with the Headmaster about this, but first, I have to ask Ren his opinion.

"Hey, got a question," I spoke up to Ren as we ran.

"Yeah, what's up?" Ren asked me in mid jump

"Did you have a similar feeling to what I did when we were around Ruby?"

"What do you mean?"

"I don't know," I explained. Thinking of how to word this, there wasn't a whole lot that I could come up with. "It's, I don't know, similar to when you get that feeling that someone is going to be important in your life. It's like when your gut tells you that something is important because of this one person. Do you get what I mean?"

I could tell that Ren was thinking about it just as much as I was. Despite not being able to see his face, the way he stayed silent after I had asked him the question was key enough. Eventually, he finally said something to me, something that we both agreed on.

"I had that feeling too," Ren replied. "But whether it's real or not, the Headmaster needs to hear about this."

"Agreed," I acknowledged.

After that, the two of us remained silent for the journey back home. We reached the front of our home after about an hour of travelling across the city. I always enjoyed living here. It was actually out in the woods a little bit, a nice quaint home that most people would equate to a mansion. It was large and secluded, much to the delight of many of us that live here. Multiple training facilities, lounges, housing, enough food to feed an army, this place has quite a lot of things that most people would love to have with them.

As we walked through the front doors, after clearing through the security checks that this place held, we were greeted with the sight of our home. I pulled down my hood as we walked through the doors and took a deep breath of the air that was held in this place. "Ah, home sweet home," I said to myself, though I heard Ren chuckle at my statement.

"You never seem to get tired of this place, do you, Pyrrha," He mentioned to me.

"Yeah, it is one of those quaint little places in society that seems to captivate you, doesn't it?" I responded in full.

"It sure is," I heard Ren say as he pulled the cloth away from his eyes, vibrant magenta shining through clear as usual. "I should probably go check on Nora, make sure she hasn't destroyed the place we live in." He started to make his way over to where he would assume Nora would be, giving me a final acknowledgement as he drew further away. "Be sure to let the Headmaster know what we encountered today. I'll give him my account in the morning."

"You have a good night, Ren," I called out to him as I headed up the stairs towards the top floor of the house. As I walked across the glass bridge above the courtyard in the inside of the walls, I noticed something. One of the mercenaries was speaking with my friend, Weiss, otherwise known to the people as Arch Mage. From the looks of things, I'd say they were taking a break from training, or at least talking amongst themselves about the results of their training.

The mercenaries, such as the golden haired one that was speaking with Weiss, stayed with us at the mansion, their commanding officer and our Headmaster working in conjecture together on many of the issues troubling our lands. Our goals are almost entirely the same, and while our methods differ on the slightest occasion, they are basically our greatest allies in our fight. They may not have super powers like us, but they do pack quite a mean punch when in a fight.

Still, the Headmaster's office was just ahead, and I had some explaining to do to him. So, with that in mind, I continued onward towards his office, the entrance almost directly in front of me. Opening the doors, I could hear the gears turning in the clockwork mechanism hanging above our heads.

"Headmaster," I said to him once I entered the room.

He looked up at me with his brown eyes, his small glasses hanging at the edge of his nose and his grayed hair shifting a little bit as his head turned upwards in my direction. "Miss Nikos, how did the patrol with Mr. Ren go today?"

"Well, there's something you should know about."

* * *

 **AN: Well, now things are starting to get interesting, aren't they. Since you guys are wondering, I do know what the pairings for this are going to be, and I can tell you what one of them is.**

 **Victory Rose.**

 **Yes I know, it's just Noble doing another Victory Rose story, but it's actually more than that, so please stick with me on this one. I promise that it'll be more than just mindless shipping in this story.**

 **Anyway, thanks for tuning into this second chapter of Deliverance: Book 1-The Rise. Shoutout to MartunaMajor for editing this chapter for me. Seriously, he is like a god when it comes to editing.**

 **Hope you enjoyed this chapter, feel free to review, follow, fave, at your discretion, and I hope you have a wonderful day.**


	3. Fated Since Birth

**AN: Something I want to address real quick. There was a guest "review" that I received from the same person on both the first and second chapter. In response to what you have been saying, it is my story and what I choose to do with the pairings have no relevance to what's happening in canon, so do not take that into consideration. Second, I deleted your reviews because I did not need to have them there, since they did not contribute to making the story any better than it is, it looked like it was just an attempt to vent your own gripes with what I was doing with _MY STORY_.**

 **I don't mean to sound like a dick right now, but if you're just going to complain about shit, then there's no reason to leave a review, complaining about a pairing that you don't like, then go and claim that it's advice for my story, which I've planned out in extensive detail. At the same time, if you weren't interested in my story, why did you come back and leave a second review for it? I thought you said you weren't going to be reading it, so what does your second review prove?**

 **Anyway, enough of me rambling about stuff I have to deal with, ONTO THE STORY!**

* * *

In all the time that I have been in this city, I never once lost faith in the one thing that made this city beautiful, the people themselves. Though they have their moments of trial and tribulation, Humanity and Faunus alike both have shown time and time again, that they will come together in order to bring the world to a better place. They have done so in the past, and they will continue to do so in the future.

Despite all that is happening now, it doesn't sway my opinions on the matter. I've been alive long enough to know that there is no point in doing so. I've seen people at their best and at their worst, and they always managed to come back to where they need to be in order to grow.

It's why I lead the Huntsmen, the group of men and women who defend this city when those who are tasked with doing so are afraid to do their jobs. Whether it's because they are frightened by the criminals that run this city, or because they have been corrupted by the very evil they have sworn to defeat, it doesn't matter. They have failed the people, and so we step in when they do not wish to do so. For that, we are labeled vigilantes, and we are considered dangerous to society, when it is actually they who are a bigger threat to society by failing to fulfill their duty.

I'm not bitter about it though, everyone has different reasons after all. Those who want to help, but feel as though they can't due to fear of leaving their family behind to suffer without them, I understand their pain. It isn't an easy job that they have, but it is a necessary one in order for the people to prosper. Those who are corrupt, whether by their own ambitions, or by the greed and bribery that they have given into, they do not deserve mercy for their selfish intents. Putting yourself above the people is the last thing that an officer of the law should do, and it is because of these people that we take action.

Fortunately, right now, all that is ahead of me, is the door leading into my favorite coffee shop. As I push through the doorway, I notice all the familiar scents that come from this place, all of them therapeutic in nature and relaxing on the mind and spirit. From the different coffee blends, to the freshly baked bread, to the many cookies and pastries that this place supplies customers with, it's no wonder that the business is very successful.

It's also one of the reasons, at least from my assumption, why Ruby Rose works as one of the baristas for this place.

Upon entering the store, I notice Ruby give me a smile, much like she usually does, and I approach the counter.

"Professor Ozpin," She says to me, using the old title I held while I was still a professor at Remnant University, though I still use the title often to this day. "It's great to see you again, you want your usual?"

"That would be wonderful, Miss Rose," I replied, always polite and civil with her, despite the fact that we've known each other for a long time. "But I will actually be adding onto this order today. A student of mine is meeting with me for a discussion."

"I thought you were retired," Ruby mentioned. Technically, she was correct, I am officially retired from teaching, and instead, devote all of my time to leading the Huntsmen all across the world with some of my colleagues. Officially though, I still do some part time lessons, the occasional lecture when it is appropriate, and while I do follow through on those commitments, it isn't as often as before.

"Yes, well one of the students from my last lecture called upon me and asked if she could meet to talk further about the subject matter we covered," I replied. "So, if you would, please add a chamomile tea to the order, as well as a buttered croissant roll. Thank you."

"Alright, I'll have these out for you in a few minutes," Ruby replied as she got to work preparing the order for me. I turned and walked towards a booth at the corner of the shop, taking the seat that was facing Ruby.

She certainly has grown up. I remember when she was a small child bouncing on my knee as I visited her mother and father. She was always bright and full of energy, the kind that could brighten up anyone's day.

"Professor Ozpin?"

I looked over and saw that the very person that I was meeting with today had approached my table. Pyrrha Nikos, one of my youngest, and yet most promising Huntsmen to date. Upon acknowledging her, she took a seat across from me at the table, and waited. "I ordered you something, hope you don't mind," I said after a few moments.

"Not at all," She replied to me. She took a deep breath and got right to work. "That's her by the way, the girl up at the counter with her hair dyed red at the tips. The one who I was telling you about last night."

"I knew of the woman you spoke of once you mentioned her name to me," I replied. "If what you say is true, then she truly is following in her family's footsteps."

"I beg your pardon, sir?" Pyrrha asked me in response. She failed to notice Miss Rose approaching our table with the food and drink that I had ordered.

"Miss Nikos," I began with. "Genetics is a very complex subject at times, though it can also be very straight forward as well. In some instances, traits that a child would inherit from their parents could either be dominant traits or recessive traits. An example of this would be eye color. In order for someone to have brown eyes, like myself, one parent would have to carry the dominant brown eyed trait." By that point Miss Rose has approached the table with our food, interrupting our conversation.

"Sorry, I hope you don't mind Professor Ozpin ordered for you," Ruby said. "I'm sure you'll enjoy it, he's usually good at figuring out what people would like to eat or drink, I should know."

"It's fine," Pyrrha said, smiling at Ruby, with a faint blush crossing her cheeks. "I'm sure it will be incredible regardless."

"Well, have a wonderful meal," Ruby said as she returned to the counter for the next orders.

"I hope you enjoy your food," I mentioned to Pyrrha. "Chamomile tea and a croissant roll. Now, where was I?"

"You were mentioning dominant and recessive traits in genetics," Pyrrha recalled as she took a sip of her tea.

"Ah yes," I remember. "Like eye color, the powers you possess were passed down from your parents through their genetic code. In some cases, it could have been passed down without them knowing about it, for the powers we have are a recessive trait. Your parents would have needed to have the mixed allele pairing, meaning they carry both the dominant and recessive traits at the same time, in order for you to be born with the single possibility of having powers in the first place. From there, it's a simple game of chance that determines whether you carry the dominant trait or not. Given that you have powers, you were one of the few that fell within that criteria."

"So when you say that Ruby is following in her family's footsteps…" Pyrrha said, leaving the rest of her sentence hanging on me to finish.

"It means that both of her parents had this power, and so she was guaranteed to be born with it herself," I mention. "Given that the powers unlock at a random point in your life, it's impossible for us to have known when this moment would happen, until you felt that power within her."

"So what now?" Pyrrha asked.

Before I could answer, I felt a vibration in my pocket. I pulled out my phone and checked the caller to see if it was a number I recognized. It was indeed one that I knew, one of my fellow Huntsmen to be more specific. "Yes?"

"We have trouble within the city," The caller said. I could hear the sounds of gunfire blaring in the background. "A couple members of the White Fang decided to try and rob a small bank, and I'm with Mimic right now trying to stop it, but we need some help."

"I'll send Miss Nikos to assist you right away," I reply, capturing Pyrrha's attention as she just finishes her meal. She eagerly awaits for me to fill her in on the location, which I listen to the person known as Arch Mage list off, before relaying it to her. Once she takes her leave, leaving behind some money for a tip, I wait for a few moments so that I may finish my coffee.

By that point, I notice Miss Rose beginning to leave herself, and I too notice the power she holds within ready to burst at the seams and overflow her. But there is a second power nearby as well, coming from someone whom Miss Rose meets with as she is walking out of the door. Contemplating all this new information, I send a message out to an old friend of mine, before taking my leave to return back to the mansion.

* * *

Ruby Rose

Today was certainly an interesting day. It was nice to see Professor Ozpin again after all, but what was he really doing with that woman, and why did she seem so familiar to me? I mean, I knew Professor Ozpin still did the occasional lecture, but he never taught biology, he taught history. Maybe he had to learn a bit about genetics in order to use it in something related to history, but to teach is as if he knew the subject matter entirely…

"Hey, Ruby?"

Hearing Jaune speak to me, I was snapped out of my own reverie. I told him that I didn't need to be walked home today, but after what happened yesterday, he really did insist. Said something along the lines of 'Yang would kill me if I didn't look out for her baby sister'. Granted, he was probably right, but I sometimes hated how Yang would treat me like a child at times. I can take care of myself, just ignore what happened last night, and I have a pretty safe track record when it comes to this kind of thing.

"What's up, Jaune?"

"You seem distracted by something," He said. He was always aware when something was bothering me, as much as I hated to admit it. "Is everything alright?"

"I don't know," I replied truthfully. "Professor Ozpin was in the shop before I left, and he was meeting with this student to discuss stuff he talked 'bout in a past lecture. The only thing is that he doesn't teach the stuff that I overheard them talking about. Next thing I know, the girl is leaving in what looked to be a hurry and Professor Ozpin was still sitting there like nothing was wrong with it at all."

"Maybe the girl had an appointment she needed to get to?" Jaune suggested.

"I don't know," I reply. "It just seems a bit suspicious if you ask me."

That's when I started to hear the gunfire. Most people would turn and run the opposite direction, but for some reason, when I heard that, I immediately jumped towards it and chased the noise down. Jaune must have been yelling at me to stop before he was chasing after me, but I just couldn't help but go see what was going on.

When I did, I couldn't believe what I was seeing. Members of the White Fang were in a gunfight with a few of the Huntsmen, more specifically, Polaris, Arch Mage, and Mimic. I couldn't believe what was happening right in front of me. Open shootout in the city, this wasn't something that happened too often, even for this city. At least, that's from what I could tell, I stopped paying attention to the news after they kept smearing the crap outta the Huntsmen for all the hard work they were doing to keep them safe.

What really caught my attention was actually the small child that seemed to be caught in the crossfire, fearing for his life. I could tell from Polaris' body language that she really wanted to go and help this child, but the gunfire wasn't making it easy for her to do so. I felt so helpless, unable to actually do anything to save this poor innocent child from a cruel death.

I don't know what it was that compelled me to run into the middle of the firefight, but for some reason, I did. I ran into the middle of the fight, maneuvering my way past the debris, picked up the kid, and somehow managed to dodge every bullet shot my way, bringing the kid over to the other side where his mother was waiting for him.

"Don't worry, you're safe, kid," I said, easing the kid that I had just saved. When I turned to look at the mother, I didn't expect her to look shocked, almost as if I was some kind of crazy. "Don't worry, your son's fine."

"How did you do that?" She asked me.

Ok, not the exact response I was expecting, but hey, I wasn't about to question this person's response of choice. I mean, it was probably fueled out of adrenaline and fear, so it's all good after all. "What do you mean?" I ended up asking, just to humor the woman.

"How did you run that fast?" The woman explained hysterically. "It was like one second you were just arriving, the other second you were right in front of me. I didn't even see you move at all, I didn't see you pick up my son. How did you do that?"

Wait...I did what?

Instead of a response, I just stared ahead, nothing at all in my focus and I tried to absorb the information that I had just learned.

Did she say that I had some kind of superpower or something like that? No no no that couldn't be possible, I've never had powers before, why would I have them now? I would have known if I had them all of a sudden.

I guess in my thought process, the fight died down, the woman ran off for her own safety, and the heroes were starting to push the White Fang back. I finally focused when I felt a bullet zip right by my ear, just barely missing me. I turned to look back and saw that things were under control, for the most part.

Except there seemed to be a person heading right towards Polaris from behind that was ready to stab her in the back.

I completely forgot everything and just acted off of instinct alone. One second I was sitting on the ground, the next, I had apparently tackled the guy who was going to hurt Polaris. I don't know why I did it, I just did. Apparently, my impact knocked him out, since he seemed to be unresponsive.

I looked up however, and saw a glyph, a traditional stasis glyph used by Arch Mage, right above me.

Sitting up, I saw it disappear, only for Arch Mage herself to appear right next to me. She wore a long, white, sleeveless coat that had a hood which masked her face. On her arms were all kinds of bracelets of differing size and material construct, and on her legs, she wore boots overtop white leggings. Right next to her stood Mimic, who was wearing a brown face mask, her torso covered in a coat that had various straps and plates attached to it. Her legs seemed covered in leggings and pretty thick combat boots, while her arms had fingerless gloves and ribbons leading up to her shoulder. On top of her head though, were rabbit ears, indicating her nature as a Faunus.

"What in the world were you thinking?!" Arch Mage scolded. Even through the voice modulator that all the Huntsmen seemed to wear, I could tell that she wasn't happy with me at all. "Do you have any idea of how dangerous it was to run out here and do what you did? You could have been killed by one of the White Fang!"

"Arch Mage, relax," Mimic insisted. "No real harm was done, and she was acting completely selflessly in her actions. Honestly, how would you react if you were a person in her position and you saw Polaris in the same situation? Would you not take action?"

"The difference here is that I have the ability to take action, where this dolt doesn't," Arch Mage countered.

"I apologize for our friend here," Mimic said to me, ignoring Arch Mage's comment. "I think it was really brave what you did for Polaris here."

"I guess you could say I was just, returning the favor for her helping me out last night," I mentioned off-handedly. "But even if that wasn't the case, I would've helped her anyway."

"That's very sweet of you," Mimic said. I couldn't tell because of the mask, but I had the feeling that she was smiling at me. Right then and there, Jaune came running towards me and started to check me for injuries.

"Jaune, I'm fine, I swear," I reassure. "Nothing is wrong at all."

"Actually," Polaris said, finally coming into the conversation for the first time. "I saw what you did to save that child's life, everything." Upon hearing that, I remember just what it was that I had done, how fast I apparently moved in my actions.

"Um…" That was all that I could say before Polaris continued.

"Ruby Rose, I need you and your friend to come with us," Polaris said. "There's a lot we need to talk about."

* * *

 **AN: And that's certainly a turn of events. I know you guys were probably anticipating this, but it's important for the story that things develop the way they are. Thank you guys for sticking with it. I swear it'll be good.**

 **Anyway, I already have the next chapter of this story ready to go, but I'm not publishing it immediately. There are other updates that come first, but don't worry, it'll happen soon.**

 **Thank you guys for reading this, and I hope you enjoy what is to come.**


	4. Rising Developments

**AN: To the guest reviewer who has a problem with my writing, if you want me to respond to anything you have to say, get on your account, or create one if you haven't, and message me anything you have to say so that I can respond there. If not, I'm going to ignore anything you have to say, because I do not want to subject the people who actually want to read this and enjoy it to any if this pointless argument. If not, well then accept the fact that I'm not going to give your comments the time of day, and move on with your life.**

 **That is all.**

* * *

Ruby

I can't believe what's going on right now. One minute, I'm going about my day as if nothing was wrong, doing my job and all that fun stuff. Next thing I know, I find myself in the middle of a firefight between the Huntsmen and some White Fang cronies, and I'm told that I did some super human stuff. Now, I'm riding, once again, on Polaris' back as she is carrying me off to god knows where, and Jaune off being lifted by two weird runic things that both Arch Mage and Mimic are creating, and it's just absolutely freaking me out right now! I never had powers, why in the absolute fuck is this happening right now?!

We've been running across the rooftops for I don't even know how long. Polaris briefly said something about how they were taking us to the place where they stayed at, their home. I was a little scared at first, hell I'm still scared, but what could I do, say no? It's not like I really had a choice at this point. Polaris told me that they had to explain some stuff to me, and apparently Jaune too seeing as how he was coming with us.

"You doing alright up there?" Polaris asked me.

I wanted to tell her the truth, that I was absolutely confused as all hell, but I figured that might not be the smartest idea while we're running across rooftops at high speeds. I look up to see Mimic and Arch Mage having what appears to be an animated conversation between the two of them. So, I guess that's some place to start talking.

"I'm alright," I said honestly. "Little confused but don't know if I should bring it up right now or not."

"Fair enough," Polaris replied to me. "I'm sure this is all very shocking and sudden, so I don't blame you for being confused." The voice modulator that everyone wore was still something to get used to. Hearing a woman sound just like some form of robot was really throwing me off as well.

"What do you suppose those two are talking about?" I asked, taking my attention away from the whole thing and focusing on one aspect of it. This entire thing was confusing, but it was easier to look at one part and figure out what was going on with that first.

"They're probably talking about what we're doing," Polaris said honestly. "I'm pretty sure Arch Mage isn't really on board with this at the moment, though give her some time. She's hard to get used to at first, but she's still a kind person, once you break through that shell of hers."

"What about Mimic, though?" I asked.

"I'm pretty sure she's on your side in that miniature debate that's taking place," Polaris answered. "Based off of how she reacted to you, how she was concerned for you, you're already good in her eyes."

"That's good to know," I mentioned. By that point I noticed that we were no longer on the rooftops back in the inner city. Instead, we were in the woods, running in between the trees and over the natural obstacles in our path.

"So where are we going exactly?" I asked out of curiosity.

"We're going home," Polaris said to me once more before we reached our destination.

As soon as I saw it, I almost let go of my grip on Polaris, that certainly wouldn't have ended well for me. Can't blame me though, seeing as how the first thing that I saw was the equivalent of a giant mansion. I let my mouth hang open so far that I almost had a bug fly straight into it at the speeds we were traveling. "Wow…" I managed to say, no other words could accurately describe what it was that I was feeling about this.

"Impressive, isn't it?" Polaris asked. I didn't even realize that we had stopped until she grabbed my attention.

"Yeah, you could say that again," I replied, before hearing a thud and grunt from over to our right. When I turned over to look at what it was, I saw that Jaune had been dropped on the ground where he was being carried. "You alright, Jaune?" I asked as I climbed down from Polaris' back.

Jaune shakily gave me a thumbs up, his face still down in the dirt. After letting his hand drop, he pushed himself up just enough to get his face out of the ground. "Yep, air sickness is kicking in again," He said to himself as he felt his stomach lurch in pain.

"You need someone to get you a bucket?" I asked, only to receive a nod in return. "Um, is there any place where I can find a trashcan for my friend here? He get's really sick after flying, and I think that this constitutes as flying, according to his body."

Mimic motioned over to a trashcan that was sitting nearby. I ran over and dragged the thing next to Jaune, lifting him up enough to the point where he could safely empty the contents of his stomach with relative ease. Once he was finished, he gave a thumbs up, signifying he felt better.

"Thank you," I mentioned to Mimic, who gave me a nod in response. By that point I returned the trash can to its original location, and then stood by Jaune and waited for something to happen.

"So, who's first?" Polaris asked her two compatriots.

"You're the one that brought her over here, you can be the first to do that," Arch Mage replied. "I still don't trust that these two are our friends."

"Then trust my judgement on the matter."

The presence of a new voice was certainly startling, and it forced me to jump in response since it was right behind me. What was even better, was that I knew the voice once it started speaking to me. Once I saw the man with my very own eyes, I was able to confirm my hastily made conclusions right then and there.

"Professor Ozpin?!" I yelped. There was just no way that he was involved in this. He was a college professor that retired a few years ago, a friend of my family, there's just no way that this was true.

"Miss Rose," Ozpin said. "I know this may seem like a shock to you, but please allow us to explain everything we can first."

Given how close this guy is with my family, I do trust him. But this, it's just too shocking to believe. I just can't help but stare at him as I wonder what the hell is going on here. Everything's just so damn confusing!

"Ladies, there is no need to conceal your identities around these two," Professor Ozpin said, speaking to the three Huntsmen standing behind myself and Jaune.

One by one, the three of them revealed their faces. First, I saw Mimic, who removed the face mask and revealed a comforting smile to me. Next, I saw Arch Mage, who pulled back the hood and revealed the ice blue eyes and white hair she carried. What I also noticed was that she was bearing a scar that was carved vertically over her left eye, though it didn't appear to have damaged the eye itself in anyway.

Last, but certainly not least, I saw Polaris' real face for the first time. What's funny, I was more shocked by her reveal than any of the others, considering that was the same person that I saw speaking with Professor Ozpin earlier today at the coffee shop.

"Now, if we could-" Ozpin began to say, before I ended up completely cutting him off.

"What in the absolute hell is going on right now?!"

"Hey!"

I heard a shrill voice coming from one of the Huntsmen, more specific, from Arch Mage. "You're speaking to the Headmaster, leader of the Huntsmen. You would do well not to interrupt him while he is speaking!" I could already tell this was going to go just spectacularly, what with Arch Mage already yelling at me just for talking.

"Miss Schnee," Professor Ozpin said, interjecting before Arch Mage could go any further. His tone left no room for debate from the girl, and she turned her full attention towards him. "That was unnecessary. Miss Rose is a family friend of mine, and given the situation, I do not blame her for reacting the way she has been."

I could definitely see her pride being taken down a peg because of that. God I'm probably digging myself into a hole right now with the way this has been going. "Understood, sir," Arch Mage replied before returning to her spot next to Mimic.

"Sorry, for interrupting, by the way," I mentioned, though it was more of a mumble than anything concrete.

"That's quite alright, Ruby," Ozpin reassured me, standing in front of me and placing a hand on my shoulder. "I understand that this is quite a strange turn of events for you, however, I ask that you please just remain calm and give us a chance to explain things to you in a clear manner."

"Yeah," I said. I really wanted to know what was going on, and Ozpin was right, I needed to keep calm about this. "I'll do my best."

"That's all I ask for," Ozpin said. He then turned towards the three Huntsmen that were standing there with him. "Miss Schnee, Miss Scarlatina, you may go about your business. Get some rest, I imagine the fight took a lot out of you."

"Understood," Mimic said, before pulling Arch Mage away and speaking to her, probably to calm down her companion.

"Now," Ozpin continued. "Miss Nikos, I ask that you bring Mr. Arc with you over to the conference room, while I bring Miss Rose over here to my office." He led us towards the mansion itself, speaking as he was walking with us.

"Wait, how do you know who I am?" Jaune asked. That actually confused me as well, since I didn't know if Professor Ozpin had actually met Jaune before. "I've never seen you before in my life."

"Quite the contrary," Ozpin explained. "You attended a lecture that I was teaching, only sleep through the entirety of it. I remember you mumbling a reply as I called out your name, though I could only laugh as you managed to do so while in a deep sleep."

I had never seen Jaune's face turn so red in his life. What's funny is I actually remember that lecture that the professor was talking about, he mentioned something about how he slept through a lecture, yet didn't get in trouble for it from the guest speaker. I thought it was funny at the time, now it just got better and better because of this new information.

"Oh, I er," Jaune stuttered, unable to form a coherent thought.

"Do not fret, Mr. Arc," Ozpin said. "I'm not here to reprimand you for that. However, I do believe that this is one discussion that you should not be sleeping through." By that point, we had reached the doors to the mansion and Polaris opened it up for us.

What I saw while I was in there was certainly amazing. Even if it looked like this was the back door, this certainly had a large vibe to it. The walls were lined with all kinds of art, sculptures, paintings, statues, anything you could think of. It was there, and then some. If anyone was trying to say something to me, I really wasn't paying any attention to it, my mind focused on the environment surrounding me right now more than anything else.

As we walked, I finally started to pay attention to what Professor Ozpin was saying. We were crossing over a bridge with glass walls and roof that hung over what appeared to be a courtyard. As we were making our way across, I could see all kinds of people down below. Mercenaries, other Huntsmen, there was no limit to what I saw. Ozpin was talking with us about the place that we were at, the surroundings that we were passing through, almost like he was giving us a tour of a place we were going to be staying at for quite a long time.

Eventually, we reached a point where Ozpin stopped and turned to us. Having spent too much time focusing on everything but what was happening around me, I finally looked towards Ozpin and put all my energy into what he was going to say to us.

"I have to speak with Miss Rose about this in a more private setting," Professor Ozpin explained. "Miss Nikos, would you be willing to accompany Mr. Arc over to the conference room down the hall and being explaining to him what you can?"

"Sounds good, sir," Polaris explained, before patting Jaune on the back. "Come on, I'm sure you're just as confused as Ruby is."

"That's certainly an understatement," Jaune said as he walked with Pyrrha over to the conference room. "I'll see you later, Ruby." Jaune called back to me before rounding the corner and disappearing from sight.

"That boy has a long way to go before he reaches his full potential," Ozpin mentioned after Jaune had left. "But, given where he is now, I'm sure he'll manage to get by pretty quickly, with some help, of course."

"What do you mean?" I asked him.

"Well, we certainly have a lot to talk about, so might as well get started on it," Professor Ozpin said as he lead me in the opposite direction of where Jaune and Polaris went.

I couldn't help but feel this was just the beginning, something was going on and I felt as though I was going to be at the very center of it all. As we walked into Ozpin's office, I just couldn't help but take it all in, as best I could. I'm sure he's interested in explaining things to me, so I just gotta try and focus on keeping my attention on him.

"Miss Rose," Ozpin began. "I'm sure you're already well familiar with this, but do you know of who the Huntsmen are?"

"I do," I answered truthfully.

"Well, did you know that I was the one that founded the Huntsmen all those years ago?" Ozpin continued. I didn't say anything, the shocked look I probably gave him being enough to discern an answer for him. "Well, I started the Huntsmen a long time ago, to combat the corrupt system and deal with the criminal elements that continued to exist, despite the government's claims that they were handling things. We act as a force that protects the people, while also bringing the corruption that has embedded itself into the various governments and military powers that occupy the world we live in. There are many in the governments and military that are immune to the corruption, however they are few and far between. Those that want to see the corruption end, they see the good in us and support us, even if it isn't publicly of course."

"I know," I couldn't help but mention to him. Unfortunately, I still had plenty of questions for him, that only he could answer. "Not to be rude or anything, but what does this have to do with me exactly? I don't have any super powers!" I don't know why, but I guess I got pretty heated at that last part.

Ozpin pulled out a tablet, handing it to me with a video already loaded up on the screen for me to see. "I can dismiss the notion that you don't have any powers right here and now, just with this one video alone," He explained to me.

As I took a look, I recognized it to be security footage of what was going on during that shoot out in the streets earlier that day. I saw the boy whose life I ended up saving, huddled up and afraid. Next thing I know, I saw him over with his mother, my actions all taking place within the span of a few milliseconds according to the video. Ozpin then pressed a button on the tablet that rewound the video just enough to where I could see the whole moment.

This time however, he played it back for me in slow motion, frame by frame. As I was watching the frames tick by, I noticed a red blur appear and grab the boy, taking him over to his mother all within the span of a fraction of a second. One frame I was out of view, a few later, I was right next to the mother, I don't even know how something managed to catch me running that fast in the first place.

Somehow, I just couldn't believe that this was real. I couldn't imagine that what I just saw was me. It wasn't as though I was against the idea, it just seemed to be too unrealistic. I didn't show any powers within me before, and I would've known if I had them by now. But seeing this video, witnessing something that I had done, it really started to put things into perspective. That's why I was brought here, that's why Polaris and the others willingly showed me their home, because I'm just like them.

Of course, I couldn't spend much more time dwelling on the matter, for I soon heard someone else coming into Ozpin's office.

"Oz, you needed to speak...to me...about...something…"

It was a voice that I recognized, at least it should be one that is fairly discernible to me. I turned around and saw the ever so familiar tuff of blonde hair, the blue eyes and the scruff that covered the man's chin. I was surprised that he was here, but given how the day went, I shouldn't be too surprised by this either.

"Dad? What's going on right now?" I asked him.

"I was about to ask you the same thing," My father replied.

"Taiyang, Ruby," Ozpin interrupted. "Please take a seat, I have a lot to explain to you."

* * *

 **AN: Now, why would Taiyang have any reason to be there? I'm sure you guys know the answer to this, but just know that it's all in the plan. Thank you guys for tuning in this week, and so now I'm going to ask you guys a question.**

 **What do you think Jaune's powers are going to be?**

 **Yes he is going to have powers, I said that it was going to happen. So, what do you guys think it will be?**

 **Thanks for tuning in this week. Please don't forget to follow/fave/review at your own disclosure. Have a wonderful day, and you guys are REALLY going to enjoy tomorrow's chapter!**


	5. New Players

_Ruby_

"No, I'm not doing this, Oz," My dad said to Professor Ozpin. I still had no idea what was going on, yet somehow my dad knew what it was.

"It's not for you to decide, Tai," Professor Ozpin rebuked. Jesus, it's like I'm no longer in the room. I bet that if I were to say anything, it wouldn't be heard at all. "Ruby is old enough to make this decision herself."

"I'm not going to go through this again," Dad said.

"Go through what again?" I tried to ask, though from the looks of things, my question was going to fall upon deaf ears.

"I can't be the one to deny someone their true calling, unless they choose it for themselves," Ozpin continued. Seriously, what the hell do I have to do to get their damn attention? Honestly, at this point I'm half tempted to take the dagger that is on display above the fireplace, and stab it into the desk.

"Don't try to tell me that I can't make this decision for my daughter," My dad said. As tempting as the dagger is, I really shouldn't ruin Professor Ozpin's nice desk. It looks like it's made of mahogany or something. "She's too young to be thrown into this life anyway!"

"You and Summer both started this when you were younger than she was," Ozpin said. That's it, fuck the mahogany, I'm getting the knife. As I stand up and walk over to pick up the dagger, the two of them continue to talk about me as if I wasn't there.

"That doesn't mean anything!" My dad shouted. "You and I both know what happens in this line of work, I'm not letting that happen to Ruby!"

By that point I had picked up the knife, walked over to the desk and slammed the blade down into the wood. "Will you two explain to me what the fuck is going on right now?!" I shouted after hearing the slam of the knife embedding itself into the table. That certainly got their attention, as they both finally turned to acknowledge me.

"My mahogany desk," Ozpin mumbled to himself, though I do manage to pick up on what he said since it was so quiet in the room.

"I want to know what the hell is going on!" I shouted. "No more arguing to each other about me, while I'm still in the goddamn room, no more hiding the truth from me. You two are both going to sit down, shut up and tell me what in the absolute fuck is happening!"

I could tell from my dad's expression that the way I'm acting right now is really unnatural according to him. It's rare for me to get mad, I know that already. So far as I knew, this was probably the worst that I've been. Too bad I deserve to get mad right now, all things considered.

"Ruby, please," Professor Ozpin said to me. "If you would sit down, then both myself and your father can explain what is going on. Just give us the chance to."

I take a deep breath and calm myself down, just enough so that I finally can relax and deal with this in a better way than before. "Fine, but the second you two start arguing with each other, I'm walking out, and asking someone else for an explanation. Maybe they would be more willing to help than you would."

"Ruby," Dad said to me. "Look, I don't know how to say this to you without it sounding terrible, but your mother and I, we...well…" What was it that my dad was trying to say to me, and why was it so hard for him?

"Your mother and father work as Huntsmen," Ozpin interrupted.

What?

"Worked, in Summer's case, at least," Dad definitely looked like he was about to lose his mind again. I remembered when Mom died, Dad didn't tell me what was going on, but I somehow I knew, I knew it was because of what was going on in this city. I just knew it. I guess I was right all along.

"Regardless, based off of what happened today, I think it's safe to assume that-" Of course, Professor Ozpin was bound to get cut off thanks to my dad.

"What, what the hell happened today?" Dad questioned.

"There was an, incident, in the city," Professor Ozpin elaborated. "A couple of our Huntsmen were on the scene and Ruby happened to stumble upon it. During the incident, she appeared to have moved at almost lightning speeds. It was by sheer luck that Miss Nikos happened to notice what had happened."

"I was only trying to save that child that was trapped in the middle," I rambled, unsure of what my dad was thinking. "I didn't think that would happen I swea-"

"Ruby," My dad said, interrupting me. "Is this true?"

"Er, well uh, you see," I replied, unsure of what I should say. So, I turned to the one thing I knew best, rambling like an idiot. "I was just walking, and the next thing I know I was in the middle of the fight and there were these guns and the Huntsmen were there and I saw this kid in the middle of the street and I wanted to help him and so I-"

I wasn't expecting to be interrupted by my dad, much less because he decided to give me a hug in response to what I had done. "I'm so proud of you, Ruby," He said to me after a few moments where I finally calmed down.

"What?"

"I know it may not seem like the best idea in my mind," Dad started to say. I knew where this was going, he was going to explain that he was fine with whatever was going on. "But, if you want to join up with the Huntsmen, then I'll support your decision."

HOLY CRAP THIS IS HAPPENING! It's been my dream to help these guys for god knows how long, and now I finally get the chance to do just that! I can't believe this! "Are you serious?" I had to ask, just to be sure he wasn't just yanking me around.

"Yes, as much as I don't like it," Dad mentioned. "Just, promise me that you will take care of yourself, i don't want to lose you like I lost your mother."

"I promise you, Tai," Professor Ozpin said, inserting himself back into the conversation. "She is in good hands. I'll make sure she stays safe."

"I'm holding you to that, Oz," My dad replied before standing up in his chair. As soon as he did however, we hear the door slam open, and in walks none other than my older sister Yang.

"Ruby, what the hell are you doing here?!" Yang said, immediately running over to my side and inspecting me from top to bottom as if I was just thrown into a blender.

"Yang, I'm fine," I replied, grabbing a hold of my sister and shaking her in order to calm her down. My sister works as a mercenary that often joins forces with the Huntsmen, so it was no surprise that she turned up here right now. Somehow, someone must've told her about me being her, and knowing Yang, she probably ran here instantly as soon as she heard the news.

"What do you just mean by, you're fine?!" Yang shouted at me. That's when she noticed Dad standing right next to me. "Dad?! What the fuck are you doing here?!"

"Hey, watch your language!" Dad joked with Yang, helping to cheer my sister up.

"Seriously, what is going on?" Yang asked again. "What are you doing here?"

"Well, Miss Xiao Long," Professor Ozpin said, walking around from his desk and over to our side. "Your sister has unlocked the powers that she most likely held deep within her for all this time."

"Wait, whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa," Yang said, shaking her hands in disbelief. "You mean to tell me that Ruby has superpowers? Neither of us had shown any signs of that kind of thing for as long as I can remember! Why does it happen now?"

"I can't tell you why, that's an answer that I do not know," Professor Ozpin elaborated. "However, given this recent development, it is in Miss Rose's best interest that she take up residence here, along with Mister Arc."

"Wait, Jaune's here too?" Yang asked. When I nodded to her, confirming what Professor Ozpin had just said, she just started to laugh. "Oh my god, I can't believe that tall blonde and scraggly managed to figure out that he has superpowers as well. Wait…" Yang must've had the gears in her brain turning, because she figured out that Jaune got powers, while she didn't "Are you kidding me, that idiot has powers and I don't? What kind of bullshit is this?!"

"Yang, you literally have a shotgun that spits out inferno bullets," I said in response.

"Not only that, but your shotgun has a flamethrower attached to the bottom of it," Dad said next.

"As of right now though," Professor Ozpin jumped back in. "Mister Arc has not discovered what his powers entailed, in fact I am under the impression that he hasn't even unlocked them fully yet. With training, it is my hope that he reaches the point where he is capable of doing so."

"He'll be lucky if he can find the bathroom in this place on his tenth try," Yang commented. To be fair though, Yang is right, Jaune certainly is special at times. "He isn't exactly the brightest of people."

"Regardless of his intelligence or skill level, he will receive the training needed to hone him into a proper warrior," Professor Ozpin replied. "Either way, Miss Xiao Long, I will speak with Miss Goodwitch about this, however, I believe that you should help your sister move her belongings into the estate. Tai, if you wish to do the same then feel free to do so."

"Relax, we'll get it done, Ozzie," Dad said to Professor Ozpin. "Come on kids, time for some family bonding."

"Don't family gatherings usually involve someone getting shot?" Yang asked. It isn't that she's wrong, but then again, I can't remember the last family gather where something happened that required Yang to shoot someone for whatever reason.

"Hopefully not this time," Dad said as he walked with the two of us out of Professor Ozpin's office. "Come on squirt, let's get you packed up and ready to move into your new home."

* * *

 _Pyrrha_

Well, this past week has certainly been interesting to say the least. Not only did Ruby and Jaune move in, but now they were finally getting started on their training. I'm just glad that I get to watch how things were going, because I certainly didn't want to miss this. Ruby just screamed positivity with everything she did, so watching her fight was sure to be something I would enjoy.

I looked down at the training room floor, seeing Ruby standing there in the traditional training garbs we wear when first testing out our powers. I remember the look on the Headmaster's face, as well as Yatsuhashi's when I ripped his greatsword from his hands and held it as if it were light as a feather. Thank you polarity, you definitely have been extremely useful to me thus far.

Standing across the way from Ruby, was of course, one of the veteran mercenaries we have in our merry band of neerdowells, Coco Adel. She was of course, a heavy weapon specialist, though it's kinda hard to make that claim since her primary firearm was a handheld machine gun. That's the very definition of overkill if you ask me. Fortunately, she was using static rounds right now, the worst they would do is just cause a shock for whoever got caught in the crossfire.

"Miss Rose," I heard the Headmaster say from over the intercom. "Are you ready to begin?"

I could see Ruby smile and nod in his direction, signaling for the match to begin. The rules for this match were simple of course; avoid getting hit from Coco, and then find a way to make a strike on her in some capacity. Simple enough, but that machine gun wasn't going to make things easy for her.

"Begin!" The Headmaster called out.

As soon as she did, the barrel of Coco's minigun started to spin, the all too familiar hum it generated had started to fill the air. Soon afterwards, the hail of bullets started to fire. Ruby was just lucky that she was quick enough to dodge out of the way. Soon afterwards, she started to run in a circle, trying desperately to find out how her powers worked. I could see the struggle on her face as she narrowly dodged shot after shot that trailed just millimeters behind her.

Soon afterwards though, she finally cracked the code and started to run faster and faster. As she zipped across the arena floor, I could tell that Coco was having a much harder time keeping track of where she was. Pretty soon, dust started to kick up and create a cloud across the arena floor. It wasn't enough to help Coco, who was trying to use the dust trail to keep track of where Ruby was. Soon enough, Coco was slammed into from behind, thanks to a charging Ruby.

Unfortunately for Ruby, all of her work appeared to have taken its toll on her body. As soon as she slammed into Coco, she sent herself careening off into the side of the arena, her body propped up against the wall with her feet dangling in the air. Just looking at her, I couldn't help but laugh, and it was really hard to suppress the chuckle that was trying to escape my lips. It just looked so funny, and she really was a great person for being so carefree.

Soon afterwards, the Headmaster reported down to the arena floor and watched as Coco helped Ruby to her feet. "Miss Rose," He said to her. "I see you've made some progress, however, you still need to learn how to control your energy. If this were to happen in an actual combat scenario, you would be in quite a bit of trouble. That being said, well done on your work thus far."

"Thank you, Professor," Ruby said as she stumbled out of the arena. Immediately afterwards, Jaune walked in. Now what he was capable of, I had no idea. To be honest, he had no idea as well, so this was sure to be interesting.

"Are you ready Mister Arc?" The Headmaster asked, walking out of the arena to give the two some space.

"As ready as I'll ever be," Jaune replied. This was going to be good, I could tell.

"Then you may begin."

Immediately, Coco unloaded yet again with her gun. Unfortunately, Jaune failed to dodge any of them, and was struck with an uncountable amount of static rounds. Somehow, he wasn't knocked completely down to the ground immediately, but I could tell that all of the electricity was getting to him.

"Come on kid!" Coco called out to him, taking her finger off the trigger to give the guy some reprieve. "You're gonna just get yourself killed if you don't figure out what the fuck it is you're doing!"

I could tell that Jaune was having a hard time moving his left arm, it looked limp and out of his control. My guess was that it took too much damage and that the muscles in his body were practically paralyzed from the shock. Somehow, he still stood tall and defiant.

"Got to hand it to you kid," Coco said. "You got spirit." I could hear the hum of her gun start to whir again, and I just knew what was coming. "But spirit isn't going to help you win battles."

At that, the gun started to fire once more, but this time, things went differently. Jaune lifted his arm up to block the shots, the same arm that I figured was paralyzed from before. I could see the shock in Jaune's eyes as he just stood there, his arm taking all the shots Coco's gun could send his way, yet not once did he falter this time. With that newfound determination, he slowly started to move forward until he reached Coco and grabbed a hold of her wrist, pulling it from the trigger.

Now that was pretty impressive if you ask me.

"Mister Arc," The Headmaster called out. "I see you started to notice what it is that you're powers are."

"I guess so," Jaune said, his legs giving out on him, forcing the poor boy to fall flat on his back. What's surprising, was that Coco extended a hand out to help him to his feet. "Um, thanks?"

"No problem kid," Coco said to him. "The name's Coco Adel, by the way. I'm sure we'll be working together quite a bit while you're here. You need a lot of work though, but, I think I can manage."

Yep, things were really starting to heat up around here.

* * *

 _Unknown_

The city was always a sight to see, yet everywhere I looked, I could only see the faces of people with everything they had kept hidden away. The work of terrorists had torn these people apart, and I am no less responsible for the part I played in their acts. I helped to cause their pain, and while I'm not sorry for my actions, I do feel terrible for the results. We aren't what we used to be when I first started, things are much different.

"Bull to Shadow Fang," I heard over the earpiece that was running into my ear. "You in position?"

Pulling the hood over my head, covering the cat ears that I was born with, I responded in kind. "Shadow Fang to Bull, I'm in position, heading out now." With that, I slinked back into the shadows, disappearing from sight in order to complete my task.

One of these days, I'll find a way out.

* * *

 **AN: One guess who this person at the end is?**

 **Anyway, thanks for tuning in this long, I know it's been an interesting ride, and I really do appreciate all the guesses that you guys have thought of for what Jaune's power was going to be. For reference, his power is what I refer to as, Body Manipulation. This means that he can alter parts of his body to have different aspects than what they normally would be, this could be increased strength, resistance to electricity, etc. THIS IS A LIMITED THING THOUGH, SO HE CAN ONLY DO SO MUCH AT A TIME. If he were to push his powers past that point, well, let's just say you'll have to tune in and find out what happens.**

 **Hope to see you guys again in the next update!**


	6. Explosive Conflict

_Ruby_

A few months had gone by between the first day that I had joined the Huntsman, and now I was really starting to get used to my powers. Jaune was too, though he was having a harder time of it than I was. Dad said I probably got that from my mother, apparently she was one of the most talented Huntsman that ever existed. Now that I'm here, Dad has been talking with me more and more about all the things that he did with my mother while they were a part of this organization. He really was dead set on keeping me away from this line of work after Mom died, though he never outright said it to me. I could tell though, he's still worried about me, worried that something is going to happen to me that I won't be able to escape from.

Oh, I was given the chance to pick out my codename today. Everyone around has one and it's really cool that I get to pick one out for myself. I ended up going with Blur, because after looking through the footage of my training matches, I move so fast it's like I'm just a blurry image to the camera, even when it's going frame by frame. Polari-I mean, Pyrrha, said it sounded like a nice name for me to use.

I really have to get used to calling everyone by their real names. They've been so nice to me so far, well most of them at least, and they've been very understanding of why it's hard for me to get used to. Only Weiss gets annoyed that I haven't picked up on real names completely. On instinct it's natural for me to just use everyone's codenames, since that's what I'm used to referring to them as before I joined up here. Out in the field, she has no qualms with it, probably because it means I won't be giving away any secrets by mistake.

Jaune's been having to do twice as much training as I have in order to get by. Somehow, he's still struggling with it all, but no one's really giving him too much of a hard time. I saw that one mercenary, I think her name was Coco, I saw her give Jaune a couple of lessons in hand to hand combat on occasion. In all honesty, I think there might be something going on between the two of them, even if they don't know it yet. Actually, that's a really good thing for Jaune, Coco's pretty attractive, and it'll definitely help boost his confidence.

He ended up going with the codename of Archangel. I find it funny that it's really close to Arch Mage, which is Weiss' codename. Pretty sure she isn't too much of a fan of it, but people pick up the differences between the two quick enough to notice. She certainly stopped grumbling after a while, though Velvet certainly helped with that. The amount of time they spend together, it's almost as though the two are dating or something. I tried to ask Velvet about it, but she never gives me a straight answer, always skirts around the topic. Probably none of my business anyways, but if I'm gonna be working with everyone, I figure it's best that I know about them.

There was a few other people that I met here as well, some of the other mercs, as well as a few more Huntsman. Strangest of them all was Nora Valkyrie. She's one of the mercenaries that works with Yang, but she's pretty crazy if you ask me. Very open about the kind of things she enjoys and doesn't enjoy, most of the things she enjoys involving some sort of explosion, or her boyfriend, Lie Ren. Speaking of Ren, he's another one of the Huntsman, Lotus as it turns out. As soon as I found out, I was thanking him for at least two days before he finally asked that I stop, saying something about how he understands, and asks that we start to treat each other as equals instead of me kissing up to him. I apologized probably for another few minutes before he just laughed and asked if I could help him with some training.

I've definitely got the chance to spend more time with Yang though, seeing as how we live together. She's told me all of the crazy stories that she's gotten involved in. Between her and Dad, I probably got about 300 stories within the span of a month. I'm not complaining, in fact I love the stories that they tell me, but it's gotten quite overwhelming at times. Yang's been helping me with my fighting practice, helping me keep up with the drain my powers put on my body. It sucks that she herself doesn't have powers, but that's just the way the world works. It doesn't bring her down though, nothing seems to do that these days.

She's been talking to me about some of these other Huntsman out in the different kingdoms, one in particular that had caught her eye during some of her recent trips. Goes by the name of Poseidon, and apparently he can control water, make it bend to his will. Don't know how useful it is, but hey, I'm not gonna be the person that judges others based on what kind of powers they have.

What's been fortunate for me is that I haven't had to do much in terms of fighting during the time I've been around so far. It's not that I don't want to fight, I just know that I'm not the best at it right now. I have been getting better though, I'm not completely useless to everyone else. Plus, I have a really awesome uniform. A black corset across my chest with a black pleated skirt, specially designed combat boots to help with keeping my ankles from rolling or something like that. Black leggings underneath the skirt, and a black and red shirt under the corset that practically hugs my skin. I got a special hood attached to the shirt with a mechanism inside to help keep it from falling off of my head while I'm running. I would've asked for a cape, but both Professor Ozpin, and Weiss said that it would just slow me down. Something about air resistance and the possibility of getting my neck snapped if it were to get caught on something while running at high speeds. That certainly put a damper on my idea in a hurry.

So, now I could look cool while I was out patrolling the streets, though that's not what's important. I looked down over the side of a pretty tall building and saw the life within the city as people were mulling about. It's so different, being up here now instead of down there among the crowds. I always imagined what it would be like to run up above the people, now that I'm here, it's still all too surreal to me.

I sighed and leaned back over the edge, taking my gaze away from the crowds and replacing it with that of my partner for the day. She was certainly a nice person, a bit weird though, but like I said earlier, who was I to judge. I hadn't heard much about her before, she stayed relatively off the grid, yet she's done so much for the people I couldn't help but feel in awe. Apparently, she's known as Matrix, but her real name is Penny Polendina.

She wore a pair of black slacks with a green stripe down the outside parts of the leg. Her shoes appeared to be just normal formal wear, and she wore a white shirt with baggy sleeves that covered part of her hands. She had a gray vest over that that had some intricate patterns on it, and the vest connected to some sort of backpack. She had a specially crafted mask on that covered her face and helped to conceal her identity, and it had the usual voice filter built in.

"It sure it beautiful out today," Penny said to me as I walked over to her.

"Yeah," I said as I turned around and stared out at the horizon. It certainly was a wonderful sight to see. "Just another reason why we need to keep fighting. Don't want this beautiful view to be covered in smoke as the city burns down around us now, do we?"

"One of these days, we won't be needed to keep everyone safe," Penny said. "I know it seems a bit too unrealistic right now, but I like to think that it'll happen someday."

"That would certainly be nice," I reply. "To see that everyone can get by without having to worry about whether or not they're gonna have a gun drawn on them the moment they make a wrong turn, to know that a person will have enough food, water, money to survive and live comfortably with their family. That's the kind of life I would love for everyone to live."

"Well, then we better work hard to make sure that dream does come true, don't we?" Penny said, placing a hand on my shoulders. "Come on, we better keep checking the city. Our patrol goes for another few hours at least, and we haven't gotten to the bad part of town just yet."

"Ok, yeah," I agree, it's time to move on and get back to work. Time to get back to the reason why I'm able to stand up here on this rooftop. "Let's get-"

Right before I finish my sentence, an explosion goes off next to the building we're standing on. We were nearly knocked off balance by the bomb, but somehow still stayed upright. I looked towards Penny and we both silently agreed that we needed to investigate what was happening. I ran towards the edge and looked down to see what was going on, and I saw armed White Fang troops in the streets, heavy bags in their hands as they appeared to be robbing the bank that was next to us.

"White Fang," I said. "And it looks like a lot of them too. You think we should call for some help?"

Penny looked down with me and saw what I was looking at, no local law enforcement, and plenty of White Fang with big guns on them. "Yeah, call for some help, anyone that is able to," She finally said after a few moments. "In the meantime, we should get down there and help as much as possible."

Without hesitation, she leapt off the ledge and down to the ground beneath us. I was really appreciative of the fact that the shoes I got were designed to take major impacts, including falls from pretty big heights, so they cushioned any impact that would've hurt me pretty badly. Penny, of course, had decided to unleash what was in her backpack, a cadre of swords that she had complete control over. Actually, it wasn't the swords themselves, it was the fact that they were attached to her via a very strong string. See, Penny has what she calls her powers, puppeteering, meaning that anything that is attached to her, even if it's connected through the string, she has full control over.

Using the swords to slow down her descent, she eventually reached the bottom, holding the swords around her as she scanned the area around her. I jumped down after her and landed next to her. Thankfully she moved the swords out of the way when she saw me come down next to her, I'd hate to have been impaled on one of her own swords while trying to take action.

"Call for help, I'll move ahead and get started," Penny called to me, activating the voice modulator and charging forward into the fight.

On each of our wrists, we have a communicator that allows us to speak with the people in charge whenever we need to. Doing so, I activated it and brought up a holographic display and began the call back home.

"What is it Blur?" Weiss said as she appeared on the display. "This had better be important."

"Well if you count a lot of White Fang breaking into a bank and robbing the place as important, then yeah," I replied. I didn't mean to sound dry and sarcastic, but there was only so much that I could do right now, and I didn't have time to argue. "They used explosives and things are a mess right now. Matrix told me to stay behind and contact you guys for backup before I joined her."

"Alright, we'll send someone out there," Weiss said, getting serious when I mentioned what was going on. "Now get going, you have a job to do so do it!" With that, she ended the call, prompting me to get out there and join Penny out in the field.

Once I rounded the corner, I saw that things were crazy. Penny was on the steps of the bank, trying her hardest to keep the robbers within the area until the police arrived. So, helping her with that, I ran behind them and started to push each of them back into the fray with a couple well placed kicks, before speeding out of their range and moving on to the next one of them.

It was fairly simple actually, Penny was using a few of her swords to keep herself defended, while using the rest to injure and pin down any that tried to escape, especially those that had a hand on the money. I was helping to keep everyone contained as well, and things were going fairly well. The police were bound to arrive soon and by that point we would escape and the bad guys would get arrested. Hopefully they would go on trial, but with the way the system was, I doubt that would happen. At least the bank would be able to reclaim its money.

At least, that's what was supposed to happen, if I wasn't suddenly tripped up by someone who had appeared from out of nowhere. I felt the wind get knocked out of me once I hit the ground, and barely had enough time to roll out of the way as the person who tripped me up came at me. Once I was out of the way, I stood up and got a good look at who it was that I was dealing with. This person certainly wasn't like the normal thugs that I've encountered so far, she seemed so much more dangerous.

She had one of the normal White Fang masks, but hers had a ornate design layered on top of it, signifying her as a major player. Aside from the mask, she had jet black hair and cat ears on top of her head, black pants and her torso was covered with a tattered black cloak. In her hands were two different parts of the same blade, except one was the sheath that contained the weapon while it was stored. The other half was a katana and what I could only imagine was some kind of pistol frankensteined into being part of the blade's handle.

I couldn't see her eyes, but somehow, I just knew that there was some kind of trepidation underneath that mask. I don't know why, but I felt as though she didn't want to kill me, but would if she was forced to do so. "Who are you?" I asked, my voice still hidden by the modulator.

"Who I am doesn't matter," The girl said. "I can't let you go on hurting the Faunus any more."

How in the world could she think that what we were doing was hurting the Faunus? The White Fang was more responsible for their woes than we were, and yet she was on their side. Why was she doing this, did she not know how bad the White Fang was? "I can't let these people get away with robbery, Faunus or not it isn't right," I argued back.

"I'm sorry," She muttered. I could tell just by the way she sounded, that this wasn't what she wanted to do. "But I can't let you stand in the way."

Fortunately for her, she didn't have to worry about me for much longer. Dropping down from the sky and landing in between us was a figure I had become familiar with. I saw the giant sword resting across his armored shoulders, a blade that was larger than I was. The man was really tall, wearing an olive green tinted set of armor. His left shoulder had a pauldron on it that protected him from harm, while his right was left bare. His arms were uncovered and you could see the muscles that he had on him. His head was covered in that of an old samurai helmet, keeping him safe and his identity safe at the same time.

"I'll give you one chance to leave," The Red Blade said to this girl. "You should take it before you get into a fight you can't win." Despite the intimidating appearance, I knew deep down that The Red Blade, otherwise known as Yatsuhashi, was a real sweetheart and a gentle character. Out in the field though, he rolled with the intimidation when it was necessary.

The woman could clearly see that the odds were stacked against her, so she left. At first I thought it was strange, I saw what appeared to be a shadow left behind as the person was already leaving before we realized it was a clone in her place. As she was running, once she got into the shadows, she just disappeared completely. Nothing left behind of her at all.

I had actually completely forgotten about the rest of the White Fang up until then, and when I turned to check on Penny, she was already jogging over to me, the people that were there tied up and unable to leave. "What was that all about?" Penny asked once she was close enough.

"That girl we were facing off with, she had powers much like our own," I said. "You think we should inform the Headmaster about this?" After what had just happened, it seemed like a safe bet. This was something that probably needed to be told.

"That we should," Yatsuhashi said, before we heard the sounds of the police arriving. "Come on, it's time to leave." With no arguments from any of us, we turned towards the nearest alleyway and left the area to report what we had found.

* * *

 **AN: Ok, if you can't come up with who that is by now, then I don't know what to tell you. Anyway, thanks for tuning in, I don't really have much to say right now because it's pretty straightforward. Hope you guys enjoyed this chapter and I'll see you again next chapter!**


	7. Question of Doubt

_Ruby_

I wasn't sure how long it was until we got back to the mansion, I guess I was too distracted by what had happened out there at the bank to keep track of the time. That one woman whom I fought out there wasn't like the normal White Fang thugs that walked the streets. She was something more, something dangerous. Someone like that would definitely cause us some problems.

Whoever she was, she certainly knew what it was that she was doing. She certainly seemed trained to face people like me, hell she even had some powers of her own to back up her fighting style. That was also another really weird thing, I thought that only people who had powers were on our side. If the White Fang has people like that, then this isn't going to be as easy as we originally thought.

"Ruby," Penny said to me once we reached the grounds. "You've been distracted the entire trip back. Is there something you want to talk about?"

I looked over to her and saw the mask she wore start to shift and reveal her face in an almost mechanical way. I still found it funny that her mask looked so intimidating, yet underneath was just a freckled girl who had a bright smile on her face.

"Nothing really too bad," I said. Though I was technically telling the truth, I couldn't help but feel as though there was a little bit of a lie in that statement. "It's just that woman we fought while out at the bank has me thinking."

"It does raise some concerns," Yatsuhashi commented. He had pulled the helmet off of his head and I could see the sweat dripping from his face. He may be super strong, but even that jog would have most people sweating, especially in this blistering heat. "Most important being who she is and why she was acting the way she was."

That did raise a good point. She certainly wasn't acting like the rest of the White Fang that was there. It was almost as if she was hesitant to kill me. Even what she said threw me for a loop. This is why I prefer to avoid meeting new people if I can help it, they confuse me way too much. Somehow, I always knew I'd end up doing something that would just drive me nuts in one way or another.

"I'll probably talk with Professor Ozpin about it later," I ended up saying. "For now though, let's just relax and savor the fact that we managed to take down the White-"

"Ruby Rose!"

And there was one thing I was hoping not to hear at that moment. Weiss Schnee yelling at me again for one reason or another. Honestly that's become one of the most common themes between the two of us. She would yell at me over something, and in return, I'd just stand there and let her yell. Honestly, it worked out because by the time she was done yelling, she actually gave me some useful advice once she calmed down.

"Yeah, Weiss?" I asked in return.

She walked over to me slowly. Some reason, I got this vibe that I wasn't actually going to be yelled at over this. "I saw the reports of what happened on the news," Weiss mentioned. "You got a long way to go, but that wasn't too bad."

"I appreciate it, Weiss," I said, scratching the back of my head in the process. "However-"

By that point, I realized that I still had my hood up, and my voice modulator running. Holding my hand up in pause, I pulled the hood down and let it rest on the back of me neck. "Sorry about that," I said. "Forgot I was still wearing the thing. Anyway, I don't suppose you heard that there was someone different from the White Fang there as well."

"Clarify."

Yatsuhashi took a step towards us and brought himself into the conversation. "One of the White Fang operatives had powers like us, and she managed to, quite literally, trip young Ruby here. There was something about her though that is a little concerning to us, but Ruby will explain it more to the Headmaster in a little bit."

Weiss just nodded, her hand resting against her chin as she was trying to understand what it was that we were talking about. "Well, regardless of that, you've done a fine job, Ruby," Weiss eventually said. "Credit where credit is due, but now we have a much bigger mystery on our hands that needs to be solved."

"I'll head up to Professor Ozpin's office now then," I said as I started to walk away. Unfortunately, I couldn't get anywhere before Weiss grabbed my hood and held me back.

"You do know that you still need to create your own weapon, correct?" Weiss said, reminding me that I'm in the middle of the process. "I know you were out in the field just now, but you can't skip out on putting it together."

"I'll work on it after speaking with Professor Ozpin," I mentioned. "Now, I really should get to that."

I used that as an excuse to head inside. As much as I wanted to get my weapon fully made, I needed to speak with Professor Ozpin about this whole thing. It's still strange seeing people refer to him solely as Headmaster. All my life, the only thing I've known him as is Professor Ozpin, nothing else at all.

As I walked inside, I passed by my sister, and she grabbed me and pulled me off to the side. "Yo, how was it out there?" She asked me.

"I'm sure you heard about the bank robbery, right?" I said in response. "Short version, I helped put it to an end, but there was someone there who really threw us off, and I need to go speak with Professor Ozpin about it."

"Wait, what happened?" Yang quickly asked. I knew she would do this. She would always stress out over whether I was fine or not. I didn't blame her, but sometimes she could be a bit over the top with keeping me safe from everything. It's like she doesn't remember that I have superpowers now and can take care of myself.

"Yang, I'm sure your sister is appreciative of your concern," Yang and I turned and saw Pyrrha say from down the hall as she approached us. "But don't you think that you're being a little too overbearing on your sister? I'm sure she can take care of herself."

I wasn't about to argue with that logic, plus she was on my side in this situation. Then again, it's not like I was actually saying anything back to Yang over her concern, so I'll just let this play out as it is.

"She's my little sister," Yang said. "I'm still gonna look out for her no matter what she's doing."

"Yang," I cut in. I needed to get this off of my chest. "I appreciate your concern, but please, it's not as bad as you think. I want to do this, so don't be so worried over me. If anything is going on that I need help with, you know that I'll come to you with it no matter what."

I could see the trouble in her eyes, the divisiveness of whether she should fight against me on the issue, or agree with me. I know this won't be easy for her, but it is what needs to be said. I'm growing up now, and while I'm still gonna need her in my life, I can survive on my own if I need to. I'm sure she'll understand and adjust to this with me.

"Alright, fine," she finally said to me. I couldn't help but smile when she said that, the feeling of having my sister willing to let me be a person. "But don't be surprised if I worry about you from time to time."

"That's fine," I replied, before wrapping her up in a big huge hug. I could feel the smile coming from Pyrrha as she watched us have a moment. "Anyway, I need to get going, Professor Ozpin needs to hear about what I saw earlier."

"Alright," Yang replied as she started to walk away. "I have to help set up some guest rooms in parts of the mansion."

"Really?" Pyrrha asked. "What for?" That actually did pique my curiosity as well.

"Well, a team of Huntsman from Mistral is gonna be joining us to help combat the crime here since Vale has quite a large sum of the problems. Between the White Fang, and the Fall Crime Family, we've been getting hit pretty hard. There's even been rumors running around that they've started to try and work together for jobs."

"Oh really, is your 'friend' Poseidon gonna be coming over?" I teased her. As much as I needed to go see Professor Ozpin, this was an opportunity I couldn't resist passing up.

"Oh haha, very funny, Ruby," Yang grumbled. I knew she would be able to handle it, but with how she was talking about him in the past, I found it funny that she wouldn't be more energetic about this. "For your information, yes, he is going to be here. As well as the rest of his team, Monkey King, Sandstorm, and Captain Sparrow."

"Captain Sparrow?" I asked. It sounded too weird to be a superhero name for anyone. "What kind of hero name is that?"

"You can ask him when they get here," Yang shrugged. "They'll be arriving in the morning to join up with us. I'm sure they'll be jet lagged to all hell though, so don't be surprised if they aren't exactly the friendliest of people starting out."

She continued to walk towards the rooms, probably to set everything up for the others. Now all that was left was myself and Pyrrha, who was just standing there in the middle of the the mansion foyer.

"So...shouldn't you be making your way up to the Headmaster's office?" Pyrrha asked me after a few moments in order to break the silence.

"Yeah, I guess I should," I agreed. I started to walk up towards his office, taking note that Pyrrha was walking up there with me. "You know, I'm still not used to you guys referring to Professor Ozpin as 'the Headmaster'. To me, he's just Professor Ozpin."

"I think that mostly comes from the fact that you know him from a different life, compared to us," Pyrrha explained. "Most of us only know him as Headmaster, because we only know him from this line of work. You, Yang, the two of you know him from your childhood, it's different for you."

"Yeah, I guess you have a point," I concurred. "Anyway, how was your day so far? I'm sure you heard from my talk with Yang how mine went."

"It was quiet for most of the day," Pyrrha replied to me. "I got the chance to sleep in today since I'm going out later tonight and taking a night patrol. Other than that, I've done a bit of training, and there is this new book that I've been reading called 'Life Lessons Learned the Hard Way'."

"What's it about?" I asked. Honestly, the one thing that has always given me a smile is whenever I talked with Pyrrha. We just seemed to be able to chat with each other about anything for hours on end, and it wouldn't ever get dull. We both found out that we like reading pretty early on and would often talk about what books have caught our eye recently. It's been really fun comparing the different stories that we've read.

"It's about these two women who are split apart by the one girl's family," Pyrrha started to say. "She is forced into working in her father's business against her will for ten years and finds out her lover dies along the way. The only thing is, her lover isn't dead, and instead joins a mercenary company where the main qualification is that everyone on their payroll is listed as deceased. As the story goes on, the first girl finds out that her entire life has fallen apart, and despite having found out her lover is alive, she has nothing left in the world. So she joins up with the mercenary company in order to have a second chance at life, as well as keep her relationship with her long lost lover alive. I'm only part way through, and right now they are literally in the middle of a warzone."

"Wow, sounds really interesting," I mentioned. "When you're done reading it why don't you let me take a crack at it?"

"I'll be sure to do so," Pyrrha said, beaming with enthusiasm over the idea. "Anyway, I'll wait out here for you to finish speaking with the Headmaster."

I hadn't even realized that we reached Ozpin's office, that's how drawn into the conversations I get with her. "Alright, sounds good," I replied to her before making my way towards the office door."

I knocked on the door to Professor Ozpin's office and waited for a response before entering. Before I went in, I looked back to Pyrrha, who was being true to her word in the promise she made to wait for me out there. I opened up and walked inside from there.

Ozpin was sitting in the chair behind his desk, looking down at it, it still had the mark from when I stabbed his desk all those months ago. I'm pretty sure that he's still upset that I pretty much ruined the mahogany. He gave me a smile though, one that I returned eagerly. "Miss Rose," He said to me once I closed the door behind me. "I hear you have some interesting news for me from out in the field."

"Yeah," I replied, taking a seat at the desk across from him. "I'm sure you're glad to know that the bank robbery was stopped and the money was kept from being fully stolen."

"Yes, it is good news to hear that this event was stopped before it could fully take place," Ozpin replied. "How was the battle from your perspective? Did you have any issues controlling your powers?"

"No, not really," I replied.

"Well, how about the fight itself?" Ozpin continued. "Did you find things went well for you out there?"

"Well," I began to elaborate, making hand motions that I did have something to say and just didn't know where to begin. "Let's just say that there was a pretty strange encounter while we were out there."

"Would you care to explain it to me?" Ozpin asked, curious at what I had suggested was going on.

"Ok, so while I was out there, I was helping Mat-I mean, Penny, with keeping all of the baddies from escaping," I explained. It was clear that I was going to still need some time to fully get this name thing down perfectly. "The strange thing was, while I was fighting, I got tripped up by this one person who looked like a major player in the White Fang operations. The only thing is, she had this really weirdly constructed weapon, something akin to a katana frankensteined onto a Pistol that acted as the handle, and a sheath that she was looking to use as a separate blade itself."

"Interesting," Ozpin said. "Go on."

"So when we were there, I asked who she was, and the funny thing was how she answered," I went on to explain, recalling as much as I could about the encounter. "She seemed like she regretted having to be there, almost like she was against what the White Fang was doing. She was telling me how she wouldn't let me bring harm to the Faunus anymore, even though I wouldn't ever do that to begin with. Yatsuhashi showed up soon afterwards and scared her away, but when she left, it was almost as if she did so with the use of powers just like the ones we have."

"Really?" Ozpin asked. Somehow, I could see that little tiny sliver of concern over this, but it was quickly masked by indifference. Still, it was there, and I knew that this was going to be bigger than I originally thought it would be. "It's not unheard of for a few members of the White Fang, or even the criminal empires themselves to have some form of powers, but they do not match in numbers to what we have. In any case, it is cause for concern and we should take extra care when handling those individuals."

Ozpin stood up from his desk and walked over to the fireplace, standing in front of it and watching the flames crackle and burn. It looked like he had a lot on his mind, but it wasn't something I needed to worry about. "Thank you for relaying this information to me, Miss Rose," He said after a few moments. "You should go get some rest now."

I stood up at that point and started towards the door before a thought entered my mind that I needed to voice. "Do you think we should offer that woman a chance with us?"

That question clearly threw Ozpin off, for he turned towards me quickly and looked really confused by what I had just said.

"I mean, if she really is feeling as though she doesn't want to take part in the business of the White Fang, like I felt she was," I went on to explain. "Shouldn't we try to show her that we can give her a better life, and a better way to make a difference in the world?"

Professor Ozpin took a few seconds to answer my question, but I really didn't have to wait long for a response. "Well, if you have the chance, I'm sure you'll be able to make that call."

In essence, Professor Ozpin just gave me the ok to try if I felt it was worth it. That itself is what I needed to know, since I had a feeling that I wasn't done running into that woman just yet. "Thank you, Professor," I said before actually heading out the door.

I'm happy to see that Pyrrha still waited for me through it all, though it wasn't a long meeting to begin with. Might as well relax while I could.

I can just tell that I have a long journey ahead of me.

* * *

 **AN: I know it's been a while since I updated this, or anything for that matter, but I've been busy with real life. Somethings worked out, some didn't, I'm not gonna get into the details. Long story short, I'm going to be working more towards getting more writing done for my own personal stuff. Hopefully you'll see some updates from more of my own stuff in the near future, and we'll see where things lead to.**

 **Thanks for tuning in this week, I'm sure you can see what the next couple of chapters is going to be exactly. I'll see you guys in the next update!**


	8. Landing in Vale

I swear these people are going to be the death of me.

Between having these powers and fighting against the criminal rapscallions that continue to plague the world, I'm going to die by the age of 30. It's even worse knowing that a few of my "companions" are either immature or completely dim-witted to the point that I'm surprised how they managed to get past high school, let alone find themselves aligned with the Huntsmen. Scratch that, I'm going to be dead by the age of 25 if I'm lucky, and I'm only 23 years old now.

But where are my manners, I'm sure you're curious to know who I am.

My name is Weiss Schnee, former heiress to the Schnee Dust Company, and now full time Huntsman. I'm sure you're curious as to how I managed to find myself wrapped up in the business of fighting crime when I had such a well off lifestyle ahead of me. Honestly, I'm perfectly happy where I'm at right now.

About a year ago, I found out that I had special powers. My father tried to hide me away, keep me from running off and fighting against the powers that be like my sister Winter did. Before that, I was raised basically as a pawn in his operations, given no choice for what I was to do in life, and it was terrible. I was told that if I wasn't perfect, then nothing good would ever come to me, and so I grew up with a lot of resentment for my father, and for the world itself as well. I'm pretty sure you wouldn't want to experience that in your life. Not so perfect as you expected being rich and famous, huh?

Anyway, once I discovered my powers, my father locked me away and tried to keep me from experiencing the world. Fortunately, I was still able to keep in contact with my sister, even after she ran off. I told her about these powers, and she was back sooner than I thought possible. She easily broke me out of my own home, more like a prison than a home though. My father certainly isn't happy about it, but what can he do really? I'm out of his reach, and as much as he likes to, for a lack of a better term, bitch and moan about it, he can't do anything to me anymore.

The only downside to me being able to escape was that I couldn't stay with Winter out in the world. As much as I like to think it, my father still could do some damage if he found one of us. Even if he couldn't do anything to us personally, he had enough pull in all the corrupt governments that the Huntsman I fought side by side with would have to face the consequences.

So, Winter and I split up.

She returned to working with her superior within the Atlas Military, General James Ironwood. I heard from her up in Atlas that they were planning on allowing people like us, those with powers, to join into the military as a part of a special task force to help route out crime. Of course, it isn't without its faults, but then again, nothing ever is. Still, they are at least working as best they can, and it's hard to argue with the results, despite how much it looks like the military is indoctrinating those within its ranks.

You might be wondering where I went once the two of us split up. Well, once Winter broke me out, she and General Ironwood arranged for me to meet up with the Headmaster. He is a colleage of the General, and is the man who founded the Huntsman all those years ago. Now I'm working with him in Vale to help undermine the criminal empires that run roughshod over the people.

Things haven't been perfect, and honestly, I couldn't be more grateful for it. I've run into some interesting people along the way. Some of the mercenaries that work with us are...more than a little eccentric. I need only point out Nora Valkyrie in order for you to understand what I mean by that. Fox Alistair and Coco Adel have shown to be pretty effective at what they do, and despite how absolutely brutish she acts, I have to admit that Yang Xiao Long is very good at her job.

Speaking of Xiao Long, her little sister, Ruby, has been making a little bit of progress with her training to be one of the Huntsman. I know I give her a hard time, but in the end, I'm sure it'll be to her benefit. If no one pushes her to be better, then would she be able to reach new heights? She'll understand one of these days.

It's such a surprise to see her refer to the Headmaster by something other than "Headmaster". They really do know each other, and have for a long time. I guess that's why he's so confident in what she can do, because he knows the kind of person that she is.

Anyway, I should probably go help out with the new arrivals. The transport bringing them in should be landing soon, and they should be in need of getting some of their belongings taken care of so they can rest.

* * *

"How much longer until we land, exactly?"

I couldn't help but groan once again at Scarlet's question. I mean, everyone tells me that I'm the impatient one out of the four of us, yet you don't see me complaining about this at all, and I'm the monkey in the group. No, I'm being serious. I'm a monkey faunus. The name's Sun Wukong, and I got these cool awesome powers at my disposal. I'm a member of the Huntsman just like my friends Sage, Scarlet, and Neptune. People make fun of me because my usual attire is just a white button down shirt that's left open. I also wear blue jeans with some greaves over my legs, as well as some gauntlets on my arms. I do wear a scarf that I can pull up over my face for when I'm in the field, also has my modulator in it. What I lack in aesthetics, I make up for in the fight, got some solar clones that I can create and use to fight off evil fuckers.

Sage, codename Sandstorm, he's the guy sitting in the corner of the transport right now meditating. He's got a white and green sleeveless tailcoat on right now, with tattoos on his exposed chest and arms. He's also got combat pants and boots on too. The cool part is that on his right arm, he has a brace that he uses to store sand since he can control the earth around him. It makes it easy for him to just throw up a sand barrier whenever we need it. Plus it helps him lift that giant sword he uses in his arsenal. Other than that, he has a visor he wears to keep the sand out of his eyes, with the modulator built in to hide his voice.

Now Scarlet, otherwise known as Captain Sparrow, he's a pretty crafty guy. Can fly around the battlefield like a bird, which has been super useful for us. He wears a red jacket and normal pants, a couple of bandanas and shit on his arms and around his boots, but what's really cool, is how he covers up his face. He took a bandana and wears it around his eyes with holes cut out, and some weird decorations like feathers sticking out of it. I guess it's so it doesn't fuck up his haircut or something, he's really particular about it. The bandana itself also acts as his modulator, which I don't even know how that works, but hey, I'll go with it.

Lastly, Neptune. He goes by Poseidon in the field, and is a pretty tech minded person. Truth be told he's a nerd, but he'll always argue that little detail. Anyway, he's got this weird coat that he wears, and he can control water at will. He also has a pair of goggles that are mechanized to also form into a mask that covers the rest of his face once they drop down overtop of his eyes, though like Scarlet, it doesn't do anything to his hair. I think that's pretty cool too, I mean, who else can pull off blue hair? Not many people.

"You know, time would pass by much faster if you weren't so focused on the time itself," Sage replied from the corner.

"I'm sorry that I want to get out of this stupid airship," Scarlet replied back to him. "I can fly on my own just fine, I don't need this transport to take me there."

"Uh, dude, you do realize just how far this place is from home, right?" I replied. "I don't think even you could fly over the entire ocean between Mistral and Vale, let alone the rest of the trip over land itself."

"Yeah, while I'm not agreeing with Scarlet for the same reasons, I do want to be on the ground already," Neptune chimed in. No surprise there, I'm pretty sure we all know why he wants to land.

"I'm sure Yang appreciates the thought, pretty boy," Sage jabbed.

I guess Neptune wasn't in the mood for snarky comments considering he just walked over to Sage and shoved him over. All of us couldn't help but laugh at Neptune's expense, it's too fun having a laugh with your friends. Neptune knows it's all in good fun though, and soon enough, he's laughing along with us as we continue to ride in the bullhead.

"If you jackasses wouldn't mind taking a seat," I heard the pilot call out over the intercom. "Then I could actually begin landing. We're just over our LZ, and I can't get to a lower altitude until you guys are secured."

"Alright boys," I called out to everyone. "Looks like we're here. Everyone get situated, we should be down on the ground soon."

I took a seat and strapped in my harness, watching as everyone else did so before feeling the transport drop down towards the ground. It shouldn't be much longer till we land, so hopefully we can finally get to work once again.

* * *

 _Weiss_

I always hate taking the route through the caves. It feels like anything could come out and attack you in an instant. Despite common belief, the Grimm haven't been completely wiped out, more like they've been pushed back pretty far to the point where they are not really that big of a concern anymore for the common people. Those of us who travel outside have run into the occasional beowolf pack or ursa. Normally it isn't something we can't handle, and it happens once in a blue moon in all honesty, but I keep saying that the Grimm still being around isn't a good sign.

At least Velvet is here.

Surprisingly, Velvet has been one of the few people whom I've gotten along with the most during my tenure as a member of the Huntsman. She also has a really surprisingly powerful ability that is at her disposal. Velvet has the power to use another person's powers for a limited time. She has to actually touch the person in order to do so, and she can only use one person's powers at a time. More often than not, we are working together and she is utilizing the same powers as me. She's actually gotten pretty good at it for the most part.

Yatsuhashi is also here, along with that brute Xiao Long. Apparently blondie has met the guys we're bringing back to the mansion, so it does make some sense as to why she would be joining us. Still, if I have to hear one more stupid pun from her, I'm going to flay her with my mind.

"Weiss, you alright?"

I turned towards the voice that called out to me from the truck that Yang was driving. Velvet was giving me a concerned look, one that I honestly did appreciate after all. She really was my best friend within our little band of "heroes". I really could talk to her about anything and not have any feeling of worry that she'd do something to harm me in some way.

"Yeah, why?" I asked in response.

"You look like something's bothering you," Velvet answered. She's probably the only person who can read me so easily. "I know that look, tell me what's up."

"I'm concerned about this whole thing," I mentioned to her. I looked up towards the front of the truck, hoping that Yang and Yatsuhashi weren't paying attention. Fortunately, they looked to be deep in conversation and ignored me. "We don't know anything about these guys that are joining up with us from Mistral. What happens if they're spies for one of the major crime families, or god forbid, the White Fang?"

"Well, that's what Yang's for," Velvet replied. "Remember, she's met with them, and worked in the field with them. She may have her faults, but Yang knows when someone is trustworthy or not."

"It's not just that," I interjected. "After finding out what Ruby, Penny and Yatsuhashi discovered, I'm a little concerned about how we're going to combat the criminal organizations if they end up having people that are similar to us. Plus, I don't like going through these caves, I feel as though the Grimm could pop up at any second and ambush us if they really wanted to."

"I doubt that the Grimm would be able to do anything against the four of us," Velvet assured me. Honestly, it probably is me just being overly cautious, but I think that being cautious is a good way of going about things. "As for the thing about the crime families…" Velvet taking a pause, that isn't really like her. She must be as concerned as I am for this. "...Honestly, it isn't easy to solve this one. We'll just have to wait and see how things start out, and go from there."

"That's certainly reassuring," I commented. "I'd rather not have to worry about taking the life of someone else. I'm lucky that we don't do that already."

"I'm lucky as well," Velvet said in response. "But I worry that one of these days, we'll have to end up doing just that, and it scares me when I think about it. I don't know how Yang is able to sleep at night knowing that she's responsible for someone's death."

"We both know that it's different for her," I mentioned, giving Yang some credit where it's due. "First, she doesn't have powers like we do, she can't just find a way to use it into forcing people to submit. Second, the kind of jobs she's done for our cause have been the kind of work where that is just a part of the job. Thirdly, we don't even know if it does cause Yang to have regrets, so that isn't something we should speculate either."

"Never thought I'd hear the day where you would defend Yang," Velvet chuckled. She does have a point, I really don't defend Yang too often. "It's nice to see this side of you, you should let it out more often."

I don't know why, but I could feel heat rise in my face. I turned away to hide myself from Velvet, hoping to save myself from even more embarrassment over this whole thing. Fortunately, Yang decided now was a good time to intervene in our conversation.

"If you two are done flirting back there, Yatsu and I would find it really nice if you guys could join us out of the truck to greet the guys. They'll be landing in a minute, so get any sex stuff done now before it's too late," Yang jabbed at me.

If my face could go any more red, I'd be amazed. To be fair, Velvet was also blushing wildly as much as I was. "What did you just say?" I said in a furious rage, rushing out of the truck and right up to her. Once again, standing right in front of Yang, I'm reminded of just how stupidly short I am, and it just makes me even more angry than I already am. God I hate genetics for cursing me with such poor stature.

"I said the airship is coming in now, you might want to look presentable for our guests," Yang said as she turned and pointed out the airship that was coming in for a landing.

That was when Yang's radio decided to chime in. "Beacon Mercenary Company, this is angel 479er, I'm coming in for landing now. Please give us enough space in the LZ so I don't accidentally swallow you into the jet turbines."

"479er this is BMC Lt. Xiao Long, you are cleared for landing," Yang replied. "I get the feeling that there's a story behind that whole jet turbine thing, isn't there?"

"Too long to tell right now," The pilot replied, sparking my mind into imagining just how stupid someone must've been in what was clearly their final moments on this earth. "We'll be touching down in less than a minute, hope these guys don't give you too much trouble."

"I've worked with them in the field before," Yang replied once again as the ship got closer. "It's nothing I can't handle. A good ass-kicking is all that I'll need to set them straight."

"Well, they're your problem now," the pilot replied once again as they reached us and delicately touched down in the grass that we were parked in. It wasn't a big clearing, the cave entrance we had just came out of directly behind us. There was enough space to get a small transport in for a landing, much like the bullhead that had just landed in front of us.

Once the engines started to die down, the side hatch opened up and out popped a few guys who looked like they were ready to take on the world. Based on the way they were acting now, I could only imagine that this was going to go superbly well. Total sarcasm on that last note though.

"What took you guys so long?" I noticed Yang shout to one of the guys, a person with blue hair I might add. "I was beginning to wonder if I was gonna be all alone tonight."

Dear god is she flirting with him already?

"Guess you don't have to worry about that now, I'm right here goldilocks," The guy replied in what I could only guess was a seductive tone, though it only made me want to throw up.

"Oh my god will you two get a room?" The blonde guy who came off of the transport said. "Anyway, you're not gonna introduce us, Yang? I'm sure your lady friends wouldn't mind getting to know us."

"We do appreciate the help," Velvet immediately jumped in, though she sounded almost like someone who was laying down the law almost immediately. "But I know I don't really appreciate the flirting all that much. I'm sure we can be friends, but don't just assume."

What has gotten into her? This isn't really something that I've seen from her before. I mean, I'm glad that she said it, I really didn't want to have to deal with some of this flirting either, but I don't know if it's a good idea to shut it down before it really even starts. That just seems too impolite.

"Alright alright," The guy says. I finally notice the tail attached to him, giving me an indication that he is a Faunus. "Anyway, the name's Sun Wukong, otherwise known as Monkey King." Sun started to point to his friends and introduced them to us. "That's Sage Ayana, otherwise known as Sandstorm, Scarlet David, he goes by Captain Sparrow, and lastly, Neptune Vasilias, or Poseidon in the field. And you guys are?"

"Velvet Scarlatina, I go by Mimic," Velvet said immediately. "You already know who Yang is, this is Yatsuhashi Daichi, the Red Blade, and lastly, Weiss Schnee, otherwise known as Arch Mage."

"Awesome, now I don't know about you, but I want to get going and stretch the legs," Sun said in response. "You don't know how cramped it was in the airship."

"It isn't gonna be much better in the truck, you know that right?" Yang replied as she started to help Neptune load their bags into the car.

"Eh, at least the drive won't be too long, then we can get settled in," Sage mentioned. "So, do you guys want to get on the road?"

I immediately turned towards the airship to help pull some more of their gear out with my glyphs. "I'd be more than happy to get this done with," I replied. "No offense of course."

"Lady, you have no idea how much it would take to actually offend us," Scarlet said as he jumped up and took flight.

"Oh this will be fun," I whispered to myself as I continued to help grab some of the gear.

* * *

 **AN: So, we get to see some new perspectives from the story, as well as introducing some characters into the universe itself. That's what this chapter was mostly about; it was meant to introduce characters and perspectives, as well as give us some backstory on one Weiss Schnee. On top of that, there's some relationship drama going on that I've either bluntly hit you guys over the head with, or am subtly leaning you towards so that you don't end up surprised.**

 **Shoutout to MartunaMajor for continuing to be a more than phenomenal editor. Considering the workload he gets not just from myself, but from all of the Legion, it's a surprise why he bothers to put up with it anymore. So huge thank you to him for being pretty much the equivalent of Captain America!**

 **Anyway, thanks for tuning in, I'll be sure to update you guys with more of this and other stuff soon. Have a great day!**


	9. Chance Encounters

_Ruby_

Why can't I seem to stop thinking about that one girl I ran into at that bank robbery? It's been a few weeks now so you figured I wouldn't be contemplating all of this, yet I can't seem to get her out of my head. Why did she fight me? Why does it seem that she isn't truly in line with the White Fang? What could be done with her being around? How can I help?

Yang keeps telling me that it's not good to think too hard on these things. She tells me that 'over-thinking stuff like this is only going to drive you insane, and that's the last thing you need on your plate.' She doesn't understand how big of a deal this is. I love her to death, but since she doesn't have powers of her own, at least to my knowledge, she doesn't know of the potential dangers that come into play with that burden. She doesn't understand that someone with superpowers working for the criminal empires only makes them more dangerous to deal with.

At least Pyrrha seems to get why I keep feeling this way. She's been the most supportive of me to date.

Still, Yang is right in one regard, I do need to try and relax a bit more so that I don't drive myself insane. I'm not gonna stop thinking about this issue, but it isn't going to turn me into a paranoid lunatic by the time this is done.

Well, I'm thankful that the mansion has some pretty nice training rooms. I've been working on my hand-to-hand combat with Yang and Coco whenever we all get some free time. That's been my weakest aspect so far, which is good that I can move fast. It allows me to get out of there quickly whenever I need to do so. Usually I leave the close fighting to someone like Yatsuhashi or Yang since that's what they normally do. For those times that I do need it, I'm glad that I can at least do something instead of nothing.

That's where I am right now, training by myself for the moment since Yang and Coco are out in the field working right now with some of the other mercs. Pyrrha is out on patrol with Velvet at the moment, Yatsuhashi is off working out in one of the other rooms with Jaune, the new guys that came here are off getting accustomed to the capital so that they don't get lost any more than they already have, Ren and Nora are out on a date right now, and Penny is off polishing her swords. All that leaves is Weiss, who still doesn't have the greatest opinion of me. I need to do better at making friends.

I wouldn't actually say that, ever since I got here, everyone's been super nice and awesome, it's just that they have their things that they do. I don't want to interrupt their time.

In any case, nothing I can do about it right now, just gotta focus on the training and not about anything else. Not gonna think about this dilemma I'm having with this person on the other side of the coin, who happens to have powers of their own and is working for the bad guys. Nope, not gonna think about that at all.

Ok, nevermind, that's on my mind again. Oh well, might as well take out my frustrations on the punching bag in front of me. Simple combos that Yang told me about, though it isn't as effective as facing a live target. Yang said it's more to focus on the accuracy of my hits, rather than working in a live scenario where there is a lot more to consider. Focusing on one thing at a time works in some ways, allows me to build up my skills and then apply them all together when it comes down to it.

"Need a hand squirt?"

I turned around and saw someone I haven't seen in quite a while. Low and behold, my Uncle Qrow was standing in the doorway to the training room.

"UNCLE QROW!" I yelled as I zoomed right over to him and wrapped myself around him in a huge hug. Once I had my full grip on him, I looked up and smiled at him. "Hi."

"Excited to see me?"

"Um, yeah?" I replied. I hadn't seem him in a couple of months, even well before I joined up with the Huntsmen. "Wait, don't tell me you're one of the Huntsmen as well. Or did Dad tell you where to find us?"

"No, I was around when your parents got their start as well," Qrow mentioned. "I still can't believe you've made it here. I remember when you first got the idea that you wanted to be a part of the Huntsmen in the first place. God that must've been what, ten years ago?"

"Something like that," I replied. "Still, it's so good to see you, did you miss me? DID YOU MISS ME?!" I was beaming with excitement since I got to see my uncle again. If anyone was around and able to figure out what was going on, I imagine that I would be a funny sight to see right now.

My uncle cracked a smirk, a telling sign that he was up to something. "Nope," He said, though I knew that it wasn't the case. "So, how does it feel being a part of all this?"

I finally let go of my uncle and stood back on my own two feet. "It feels weird, not in a bad way, just…" I really didn't know how to describe it. "I never thought I'd make it here. Even now after all this time being a part of the Huntsmen, I still am just waiting for the moment when I realize that this is all just a dream."

"You made it here of your own volition," My uncle replied. He always was a huge influence on my life, despite some of the less than savoury things that he does with his life. "Honestly, if anyone deserves to be here more than anyone else it's you. You did it kid, you made your dream come true."

That got a nice smile out of me, my uncle really knows how to cheer me up, even when I don't need it. Then again, right now, there's just a lot of things that I need to consider.

"Something on your mind kid?"

"Huh?"

"You look like there's something bothering you right now," My uncle said to me. "Wanna talk about it?"

As much as I wanted to talk about that, I've spent too much time focusing on it right now that it'd be a moot point to continue on with it. "It's nothing I haven't mentioned to most of the others already. Nothing that can really be done about it right now anyway."

"Alright, if you say so," Uncle Qrow conceded, though I could tell that he was a little skeptical of my response. I'm glad he decided to drop it, since I didn't know what I would say in the first place. "Anyway, I actually have a delivery for someone here, goes by the name Weiss Schnee."

"Oh, I can take you to her," I volunteered. As I made my way out the door, I grabbed my uncle's hand and dragged him towards where I thought Weiss would be at this time. "Come on, she should be somewhere here in the mansion."

"Hey, slow down kiddo!" My uncle shouted as he was being dragged along by me. I will admit that maybe I was going a bit too fast at the moment, but at least I wasn't using my powers to get us there. Once I slowed down and allowed him to walk normally, he pulled out his flask and started to take a couple of glugs from it.

Honestly that's the only thing I don't like about my uncle, his insane drinking habit. It's like he has some almost all the damn time, I don't need to see him throw his life away in a drunken stupor. I wish that there was something I could do to stop it, but it's out of my control right at the moment. Maybe later on, but who knows.

"What do you think you're doing?"

I had failed to notice that Weiss was actually standing right nearby us, so much so that I ended up jumping in surprise when I heard her voice. "Oh Weiss, we were looking for-"

"Why in the world would you bring a random stranger here when you of all people know how secretive we are?" Weiss started shouting at me, accusing me of being a 'dolt' as she liked to call me. "Do you realize how much of a problem this is going to cause for us now?"

"Hey kid," Uncle Qrow stepped in, probably because of how Weiss was yelling at me. "First of all, maybe you should recognize that this isn't the first time I've been here. Hopefully that doesn't give you a heart attack or anything, wouldn't want you to get confused on why I'm here. Second, I'm actually looking for you specifically because I have a message for you."

"And what makes you think that I'm the person you're looking for specifically?" Weiss asked. "I haven't even told you my name, and I don't know if I want to."

She did have a point, neither Weiss nor I have given my uncle any inclination as to who she was at all.

"Because the person who asked me to deliver this message said that the person who is receiving it as an almost uncanny resemblance to what she looks like," My uncle replied. "I doubt that there are many people who share similarities with you genetically, so you got any ideas on who that might be?"

Ok, seeing Weiss' eyes go wide when she heard what my uncle said was kinda funny to watch. It was almost like she pulled a complete 180 in a heartbeat. "You have a message from Winter?" She asked quickly.

"She asked me to give you this letter," Uncle Qrow mentioned, pulling the letter out of his jacket pocket. "I ran into her a little while ago and helped her out of a tight spot. Don't worry she's fine, she's got a pretty good gig going where's she at."

As Uncle Qrow pulled out the letter, Weiss all but snatched it out of his hands. "You didn't read this, or do anything of the sort, did you?" Weiss asked, all but accusing him of some petty things.

"Don't worry, though I do know about the whole thing with you and your family," My uncle mentioned, though that gave me a few things to think about. "You can trust me, just like you can trust my niece here. She's a good egg."

"What kind of egg?" I asked, almost wishing that I thought of what I had just said before saying it.

"I would say scrambled, but you've shown that you have at least some intelligence," Weiss replied.

"I'd say I'm more sunny side up instead," I countered.

"In any case, I actually gotta go speak with Ozpin, so I'll catch you later kiddo," My uncle said as he ruffled my hair a bit before taking off.

"Suddenly I'm starting to make at least some sense of you," Weiss jabbed at me. "If you need me, I'll be over in my room." Weiss then took that as her time to leave and go off to her own things once again.

Now that I'm alone again, and that I'm probably not gonna be able to do any more working out, I might as well go out and do something. I went back to my room and got changed before heading down into the town.

For me it wasn't that long of a walk, I have super speed so going to and from places really isn't that big of a deal when you think about it. So I was soon standing at the edge of the city near one of the checkpoints.

That's how they keep track of who's going in and out of the city, the military set up these border checkpoints to figure out who is coming and going. It was this whole thing that they introduced years ago to stem the flow of 'contraband' moving into and out of the city. All it's really done is caused some problems, since most of the border patrol that is there is corrupt beyond anything I could imagine. Anything that doesn't come in through the underground tunnels, usually ends up going through the corrupt officers who get paid off at the gates. Instead, they turn away the occasional starving family who can't afford to get into the city.

Honestly, it sickens me that they would do something like this, but there's only so much that I can do right now. If we start to combat the police and military, we may not have as much support from the general population, because they will see it as us tearing down one of the few lines of defense that they have. No, we'd have to handle it in a better way. Gathering evidence of their misconduct, exposing a corrupt officer here and there, those sorts of things are what we could do.

What we as Huntsmen do is there's a few locations that only we know about that allow us access into and out of the city freely. Still, I'm worried about how long it'll last for.

As I make my way there, I start to hear a noise that puts me on edge. It almost sounds like someone running, only they're being chased after by someone else. Obviously I'd look into that, but the first thing I would need to do is find a way to disguise myself, so I wouldn't get made.

Fortunately, we usually keep some small portable disguise kits with us for situations just like this. It doesn't help us completely, but for those moments when we're in the field and have no time to make a switch into our usual outfits, it works well. So I donned my own disguise kit and make my way towards the running, trying to keep as quiet as possible in case it turned out to be nothing.

I'm certainly glad that I did, because the first thing I noticed when I came closer, was a young girl being chased by what looked like an upper member of the White Fang. The two of them ran, the larger guy chasing after the admittedly smaller girl, and I just couldn't stand by and do nothing.

Before I could move though, I saw something that immediately caught my eye. The girl tripped and fell, and the guy tried to grab her. But instead of actually getting a grip, she moved away in a flash. What's crazier, was that she left a clone of herself behind that dissipated in the taller guys grip. She ended up moving right behind him and kicked him forward before pulling out an all too familiar weapon, a pistol with a katana frankensteined together into some weird combination.

This was the exact same person that I encountered at the bank, only now she looked to be on the outs with the White Fain.

I was right all along, there was something about her that seemed off when we first ran into each other. I could almost feel like she was going to play a bigger role in all of this. Now there were even bigger questions. What happened that caused her to leave the White Fang? Why was she being chased? Did she really leave the White Fang, or is there something else going on?

One thing that I didn't need to ask about, she started shooting at the person who was chasing her. Luckily for him he seemed to find some form of defense against the shots, some kind of power of his own I guess. It snapped me back out of my own thought process and reminded me that there was still someone who needed help. This girl then readied herself as though she was about to get into a fight with the guy. Whether she was a part of the White Fang or not, I couldn't just stand by and watch this fight take place without doing something about it.

After shrugging off the bullets, the guy stands up and I get a better look at him. He wore the traditional White Fang uniform, except the sleeves were removed, and he had a full face mask instead of the mask only covering his eyes. He also wore a weird tattoo that adorned his well-above-the-average muscular arm. Even weirder was that the guy was fighting with a chainsaw.

There wasn't much I could do, but who knows, maybe I'd be able to at least distract the guy long enough for us to escape. Being out here alone, makes me wish that I had come along with someone. Still, I'm a Huntsmen, and I can't let anything stop me. With that in mind, I charged towards the guy and jumped to kick him back, hopefully catching him off guard.

At least when I made contact, I knocked him backwards a bit. He clearly didn't see me coming, but now my stealth advantage is gone. I moved in between myself and the girl, holding my arms out as if to shield her from anything that came her way. I could tell that I had stunned him for the moment, but now he looked even more furious than before. At least, that's what I'm assuming, that mask makes it hard to see what he's looking at. For the moment, I can feel his eyes trained on me, questioning how I had the audacity to get between him and this woman. Despite my nerves starting to take shape, I stood my ground and refused to bend.

"You will not hurt her," I said to the man defiantly, waiting for him to make his move.

* * *

 **AN: Hope you guys enjoyed this one. I don't know how much I'll be updating stuff in the future, new job that takes up a lot of my time and all that. Plus I've been brainstorming ideas for a possible novel so hopefully that goes well. Anyway, thanks for reading, I'll see you guys next update!**


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